Cfe 


matt 


Reminiscences 

\— ^*i*"*"""'^ 

of 

Bishops  and  Archbishops 


The  Right  Reverend 

Doctor  Benjamin  Bosworth  Smith, 

Presiding  Bishop. 

From  a  photograph  by  Rockwood,  New  York. 


.rfT 


Reminiscences 

of 

Bishops  and  Archbishops 


By 

Henry  Codman  Potter 

Bishop  of  New  York 


Illustrated 


G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 
New  York  and    London 

Gbe  fviuchcrbccher  press 
1906 


COPYRIGHT,  1906 

BY 
HENRY  CODMAN  POTTER 

Reprinted,  October,  1906 


Ube  Knickerbocker  frees,  *)cw  JDctft 


PREFACE 

IN  Lord  Acton's  Letters  to  Mary  Gladstone 
there  occur  two  suggestive  sentences : 
"  But  this  is  true :  history  does  not  stand  or 
fall  with  historians.  From  the  thirteenth 
century  we  rely  much  more  on  letters  than  on 
histories  written  for  the  public."  1  "You  have 
an  excellent  idea  about  those  letters.2  If  you 
go  on  and  arrange  them,  it  will  be  very  pre- 
cious to  him  some  idle  day,  if  that  should  ever 
come,  and  to  you  all.  The  inner  reality  of 
history  is  so  unlike  the  back  of  the  cards,  and  it 
takes  so  long  to  get  at  it, — which  does  not  pre- 
vent us  from  disbelieving  what  is  current  as 
history,  but  makes  us  wish  to  sift  it,  and  dig 
through  mud  to  solid  foundations  "z 

There  is  a  very  large  truth  here,  which  is 
susceptible  of  many  illustrations.  No  one 
who  has  read  any  history,  whether  secular  or 

1  Letters  of  Lord  Acton  :  The  Macmillan  Company,  1904;  p.  127 
8  These  would  seem  to  have  been  letters  written  to  Miss  Gladstone's 

father,  the  Hon.  W.  E.  Gladstone,  by  men  of  light  and  leading  in  the 

political  world  of  his  time. 
3  Ibid.,  p.  131. 

iii 


iv  preface 

ecclesiastical,  can  be  unmindful  of  the  way  in 
which,  from  time  to  time,  it  is  rewritten.  First 
it  was  the  work,  on  the  one  hand  or  the  other, 
of  strong  partisans ;  and  it  is  not  necessary  to 
accuse  them  of  dishonesty  in  order  to  demon- 
strate how,  often  quite  unconsciously,  they 
exaggerated  facts  which  made  for  their  own 
side  of  a  critical  issue,  or  minimised  or  even 
quite  ignored  those  that  made  against  them. 

Next  to  these  come  the  historians  who,  out 
of  the  rubbish,  or  the  hiding-places,  of  history, 
disinter  those  pages  in  it  which  make  not  only 
for  its  accuracy,  but  for  its  comprehensiveness. 

And  yet  there  remains  another  element, 
often  the  most  interesting,  and  always  the 
most  valuable  of  all, — the  element  I  mean  of 
personality,  or  individuality.  For  history  is 
not,  if  it  be  history  of  real  or  enduring  value, 
the  story,  alone,  of  events,  but,  most  of  all,  of 
men.  The  passionate  eagerness  with  which 
we  peruse  legends  of  illustrious  people, — and, 
indeed,  often  create  them  out  of  material  as 
mythical  and  shadowy  as  the  imaginings  of 
fable — does  not  spring  alone,  nor  chiefly,  from 
that  merely  vulgar  personal  curiosity  which  is 
little  better  than  the  love  of  gossip.  It  is 
essentially  a  sound  instinct  which  declares  that 
you  cannot  know  a  man  alone  by  what  he  did 


preface  v 

in  his  supreme  moments.  His  lighter  moments 
are  as  verily  an  integral  part,  and  as  actual 
a  revelation  of  him ;  and  we  have  not  truly 
grasped  and  apprehended  the  personality  of 
the  great  leader,  or  ruler,  or  teacher,  until  we 
know,  not  only  his  official  side,  but  many 
others  ;  the  disclosures  of  which,  it  may  easily 
be,  are  more  essentially  revelations  of  the  man, 
because  mainly,  if  not  utterly,  unconscious. 

All  this  was  brought  home  to  me  by  an  ex- 
perience which,  I  may  frankly  own,  is  largely  the 
occasion  of  this  volume.  On  Decoration  Day, 
1903,  as  some  of  my  readers  will  remember, 
there  was  unveiled,  at  the  south-eastern  en- 
trance to  Central  Park,  in  New  York,  the  impos- 
ing equestrian  statue  of  General  W.  T.  Sher- 
man, wrought  by  Mr.  Augustus  St.-Gaudens. 
In  the  evening  of  that  day  a  distinguished  jour- 
nalist and  man  of  letters1  invited  a  few  friends 
to  meet  the  sculptor,  quite  informally,  at  his 
table.  Most  of  the  guests,  and  with  them  the 
host,  had  known  General  Sherman  in  the  field, 
or  had  served  with  him  in  our  great  Civil  War. 
Naturally  enough, — especially  after  the  ladies 
had  left  us, — the  conversation  took  a  reminis- 
cent turn,  and  recalled  scenes  and  incidents 

1  The  Hon.  Whitelaw  Reid,  late  Ambassador  to  France,  and,  at 
present,  Ambassador  to  the  Court  of  St.  James. 


vi  preface 

connected  with  the  life  of  the  great  soldier 
whom  New  York  had  sought  to  commemorate. 
It  is  not  enough  to  say  of  the  recollections 
which  were  then  exchanged  that  they  were  in- 
teresting— they  were  a  great  deal  more — they 
were  illuminative ;  and  while  driving  home, 
that  night,  past  that  stately  equestrian  statue, 
I  found  myself  exclaiming  to  my  companion, 
44  What  a  regrettable  fact  it  is  that  all  the  in- 
cidents we  have  heard  to-night,  or  almost  all 
of  them,  will  disappear  with  those  who  have 
related  them  !  They  are  all  educated  men  who 
told  us  what  they  remembered  of  Grant,  and 
Sherman,  and  Sheridan,  and  the  rest ;  but  they 
will  never  put  it  down  on  paper,  I  fear." 

But,  alas,  I  had  not  gone  a  great  way  in  this 
pharisaic  judgment  of  my  fellows,  when  I  was 
seized  with  the  memory  of  official  relations  of 
my  own  with  a  distinguished  and  interesting 
body  of  men,  the  House  of  Bishops  of  the 
Episcopal  Church,  with  which,  in  one  way  or 
another,  I  had  been  connected  for  nearly  forty 
years ;  and  with  the  members  of  which  for 
nearly  half  of  that  time  my  relations,  both  per- 
sonal and  official,  had  been  especially  intimate 
and  unreserved.  The  histories  of  many  of  these 
men  have  already  been  written  ;  and  I  gladly 
own  my  indebtedness  to  them.  But  that  per- 


preface  vii 

sonal  note,  to  which  I  have  already  referred, 
has  not  always  been  conspicuous  in  them ; 
and  in  some  cases  has  never  been  recognised. 
And  in  this  fact  must  be  found  the  explana- 
tion of  the  Reminiscences  which  follow.  In 
no  sense  do  they  presume  to  be  biographies. 
In  no  light  can  they  be  read  as  embodying  the 
graver  material  of  history.  But  they  will  fur- 
nish some  of  those  side-lights  by  means  of 
which  individuality  in  human  portraiture  may 
be  detected  ;  and  in  the  often  lighter  and  more 
playful  quality  of  which  are  recognised  or  re- 
called those  more  endearing  characteristics 
which  make  men  widely  remembered  and 
genuinely  beloved. 

H.  C.  P. 

NEW  YORK. 
December  /,  1905. 


CONTENTS 


PAGES. 

BISHOP  SMITH          .....  3-12 

BISHOP  WHITTINGHAM      ....  15-21 

BISHOP  WILLIAMS    .....  25-55 

BISHOP  EASTBURN  .....  59~7o 

BISHOP  CLARK          .....  73~79 

BISHOP  COXE           .....  83-92 

BISHOP  WILMER      .....  95-120 

BISHOP  CLARKSON    .....  123—139 

BISHOP  BROOKS       .....  143-160 

BISHOP  DUDLEY       .....  163-192 

ARCHBISHOP  TAIT     .....  195-209 

ARCHBISHOP  BENSON        ....  209-217 

ARCHBISHOP  TEMPLE         ....  218-225 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


THE    RIGHT    REVEREND    BENJAMIN    BOSWORTH 
SMITH,  D.D.,  PRESIDING  BISHOP  {Frontispiece) 
From  a  photograph  by  Rockwood,  New  York. 

THE    RIGHT    REVEREND    WILLIAM    ROLLINSON 

WHITTINGHAM,  D.D.,   BISHOP  OF  MARYLAND         16 
From  a  photograph,  New  York. 

THE    RIGHT    REVEREND  JOHN  WILLIAMS,  D.D., 

BISHOP  OF  CONNECTICUT         ....       26 
From  a  photograph  by  Hennigar  Bros.,  Middletown, 
Conn. 

THE  RIGHT  REVEREND  MANTON  EASTBURN,  D.D., 

BISHOP  OF  MASSACHUSETTS    ....       60 
From  a  photograph. 

THE  RIGHT  REVEREND  THOMAS  MARCH  CLARK, 

D.D.,  BISHOP  OF  RHODE  ISLAND  .         .       74 

From  a  photograph  by  Naegeli,  New  York. 

THE  RIGHT  REVEREND  ARTHUR  CLEVELAND  COXE, 

D.D.,  BISHOP  OF  WESTERN  NEW  YORK    .         .       84 
From  a  photograph  by  Naegeli,  New  York. 

THE  RIGHT  REVEREND  JOSEPH  PERE  BELL  WILMER, 

D.D.,  BISHOP  OF  LOUISIANA  ....       96 
From  a  photograph  by  Washburn,  New  Orleans, 
xi. 


Illustrations 


THE  RIGHT  REVEREND  ROBERT  HARPER  CLARK- 

SON,  D.D.,  MISSIONARY  BISHOP  OF  NEBRASKA       124 
From  a  photograph  by  Notman  &  Campbell,  Boston. 

THE  RIGHT  REVEREND  PHILLIPS  BROOKS,  D.D., 

BISHOP  OF  MASSACHUSETTS     ....     144 
From  the  engraving  of  A.  B.  Hall. 

THE   RIGHT   REVEREND   THOMAS  UNDERWOOD 

DUDLEY,  D.D.,  BISHOP  OF  KENTUCKY     .         .     164 
From  a  photograph  by  Naegeli. 

THE  MOST  REVEREND  ARCHIBALD  CAMPBELL  TAIT, 

D.D.,  ARCHBISHOP  OF  CANTERBURY         .         .     200 
From   a   photograph  reproduced  by  permission  of 
Elliott  &  Fry,  London. 

THE  MOST  REVEREND  EDWARD  WHITE  BENSON, 

D.D.,  ARCHBISHOP  OF  CANTERBURY          .         .     210 
From   a  photograph   reproduced  by    permission   of 
Elliott  &  Fry,  London. 

THE  MOST  REVEREND  FREDERICK  TEMPLE,  D.D., 

ARCHBISHOP  OF  CANTERBURY          .         .         .     218 

From  a  photograph  reproduced  by  permission  of  the 
London  Stereoscopic  Society. 


Bisbop  Smith 


I 
Bisbop  Smitb 

HOUSE  OF   BISHOPS,   WITH  THE   RIGHT  REVEREND 

BENJAMIN  BOSWORTH  SMITH,   PRESIDING 

BISHOP 

IT  was  a  lovely  morning  in  October,  in  the 
year  1866,  when  our  good  Cunarder  felt 
her  way  up  the  Narrows  into  the  harbour  of 
New  York.  An  American  is  not  slow  to  be 
proud  of  many  things  that  distinguish  his 
country  ;  but  among  them  all,  few  match  the 
charm  of  an  American  autumn.  Its  splen- 
dours broke  on  us  as,  in  the  early  morning,  we 
climbed  to  the  deck  of  our  ship,  and  caught,  as 
we  looked  toward  Staten  Island,  the  colours  of 
the  autumnal  foliage.  One  remembered  that 
British  army  officer  who,  taken  to  West  Point, 
on  an  October  day,  by  an  enthusiastic  Ameri- 
can woman  who  lived  across  the  river,  and 
led  by  her  eager  feet  to  a  point  on  the  shore 
where  he  could  look  up  and  down  upon  the 
flaming  splendours  of  the  maples  that  saluted 
him,  was  asked,  at  length,  how  the  scene 

3 


4  3Bisbop  Smitb 

struck  him,  and  who,  after  a  moment's  pause, 
answered  dryly,  "  Pretty,  but  a  trifle  gaudy  "  ! 
One  remembered  him,  I  say, — and,  in  the 
benignity  born  of  the  incomparable  environ- 
ment, forgave  him ! 

Even  the  Captain  —  it  was  Cooke,  the 
austere,  the  frigidly  reserved — was  melted  a 
little  by  the  exquisite  beauty  of  the  scene, 
and  offered  me,  condescendingly,  the  morning 
papers,  which  the  pilot  had  brought  on  board. 
One  returning  to  the  confinement  and  drudg- 
ery of  tasks  from  which,  often,  the  only  relief 
is  to  flee  beyond  seas,  is  not  apt  to  be  eager  to 
search  the  columns  of  metropolitan  journalism  ; 
and  I,  who  then  lived  in  Boston,  and  had  that 
fine  sense  of  superiority  which  is  born  alone  of 
living  in  Boston,  did  not  scan  these  sheets  with 
especial  interest.  But  suddenly  my  eye  was 
caught  by  an  announcement  that  a  valued 
friend  who,  in  the  Theological  Seminary  of 
Virginia,  had  been  my  fellow-student,  was  that 
morning,  in  St.  John's  Chapel,  New  York,  to 
be  consecrated  a  missionary  bishop  for  China, 
In  a  moment  my  resolution  was  taken  to  be 
present,  if  it  should  be  possible,  at  this  serv- 
ice ;  and,  fortunately,  I  was  able  to  do  so. 
When  I  entered  the  church,  the  right  rever- 
end preacher  (!  grieve  to  say  that  I  cannot 


Bfsbop  Smitb  5 

now  recall  him  or  his  discourse)  had  just  be- 
gun his  sermon  ;  and  as  I  glanced  over  the 
rather  meagre  congregation,  I  realised  how 
scanty  an  interest  the  occasion  had  awakened, 
even  among  Churchmen,  in  the  metropolitan 
city.  The  sermon  being  ended,  the  bishop- 
elect  was  presented  and  consecrated ;  and 
then  followed  the  celebration  of  the  Holy 
Communion. 

At  this  point  there  occurred  an  incident 
which,  as  it  has  very  directly  to  do  with  these 
reminiscences,  I  cannot  refrain  from  mention- 
ing. The  bishops  and  other  officiating  clergy 
had  communed,  and  such  of  the  congregation 
as  desired  to  do  so  had  followed  them  to  the 
chancel  rail.  At  this  point  the  late  Bishop  of 
Connecticut  (the  Right  Rev.  Dr.  John  Wil- 
liams) walked  across  the  chancel  to  where  my 
predecessor,  Bishop  Horatio  Potter,  was  stand- 
ing, pointed  towards  the  pew,  in  a  side  aisle,  in 
which  I  was  seated,  and  whispered  in  Bishop 
Potter's  ear.  The  latter  turned,  looked  towards 
me,  nodded  his  head,  and  immediately  left  the 
chancel,  passed  into  a  vestibule  adjoining  it, 
and  thence  into  the  body  of  the  church.  Ad- 
vancing (in  his  episcopal  robes,  be  it  remem- 
bered !)  down  the  aisle  to  the  door  of  the 
pew  in  which  I  was  kneeling,  he  leaned  his 


6  Bfsbop  Smitb 

elbow  on  the  door,  and,  bending  over,  said, 
"  Henry,  how  would  you  like  to  be  secretary 
of  the  House  of  Bishops?"  I  mention  the  in- 
cident as  furnishing  a  reminder  of  the  great 
change  for  the  better  which,  since  then,  has 
come  to  pass  in  the  matter  of  appropriate 
usages  in  church.  Bishop  Horatio  Potter  was 
an  exceptionally  devout  man,  and  distinguished 
by  unusual  reverence  in  his  bearing,  in  any 
sacred  edifice.  And  yet,  what  he  did  was 
utterly  unremarked,  then,  while  now  it  would 
be  thought  impossible  for  any  bishop  to  do 
anything  of  the  sort. 

The  situation  in  the  House  of  Bishops  at 
that  time  was  peculiar.  The  clergyman  who 
had  been  its  secretary  had  removed  to  a 
foreign  country  and  had  accepted,  there,  a  cure 
of  considerable  dignity  and  importance,  but  had 
not  resigned  his  office  as  secretary  of  the 
House  of  Bishops.  He  had  cherished  the  idea 
of  retaining  this  office,  it  was  said,  in  the  hope 
of  binding,  thus,  together,  two  peoples  of  a 
common  lineage  and  a  common  speech.  But 
whatever  his  hope  or  purpose,  the  House  of 
Bishops  did  not  concur  with  him  in  his  view 
of  the  conditions  under  which  he  might  retain 
his  office  as  its  secretary,  and  promptly  de- 
clared that  office  vacant.  The  unexpected- 


JSfsbop  Smitb  7 

ness  of  the  emergency  ;  the  necessity  for  some 
immediate  provision  to  meet  it ;  the  chance 
presence  of  a  youth  who  was  as  likely  as  any- 
body else  to  be  an  inoffensive  secretary,  must, 
I  presume,  explain  what  followed  :  I  was 
elected  by  a  viva  voce  vote,  and,  I  believe, 
nemine  contradicente,  and  thus  entered  upon  an 
office  for  which  I  had  not  had  the  slightest 
training,  and  in  which  I  had  not  had  even  the 
most  meagre  experience. 

That  I  assumed  it  without  trepidation  would 
be  a  wildly  inaccurate  statement  of  the  fact. 
In  truth,  I  was  terrified  beyond  measure  at  the 
proportions  of  a  task  for  which  I  had  so  little 
fitness,  and  that  I  was  able  to  discharge  it  at 
all  was  owing,  from  the  outset,  to  a  courtesy 
and  forbearance  on  the  part  of  its  presiding 
officers,  and  one  other,  of  which,  later,  I  may 
appropriately  speak ;  and  which,  most  surely, 
I  can  never  forget. 

The  presiding  officer  of  the  House  of 
Bishops  when,  in  1866,  I  became  its  secretary, 
was  the  Right  Reverend  John  Henry  Hop- 
kins, D.D.,  Bishop  of  Vermont.  The  rule 
which  at  the  time  determined  the  occupancy 
of  the  office  was  seniority  of  consecration. 
Bishop  Hopkins  had  been  consecrated  in  the 
year  1832  ;  and  there  was  no  surviving  bishop 


8  JSisbop  Smitb 

the  date  of  whose  consecration  was  earlier  than 
his  own.  He  was  an  Irishman,  born  in  Dub- 
lin, and  his  earlier  years  had  been  spent 
at  the  bar.  While  a  layman,  connected  with 
Trinity  Church,  Pittsburg,  he  acted  during 
an  interregnum  in  the  rectorship  as  a  lay 
reader,  was  elected  while  a  layman  as  rector 
of  the  parish,  was  ordained  deacon  and  priest, 
by  Bishop  White,  and  thus  became  rector  of 
Trinity  Church,  Pittsburg,  where,  though  he 
had  long  left  it,  he  was,  when  I  went  to 
Western  Pennsylvania,  vividly  remembered. 
He  was  the  first  bishop  of  his  day  who  ven- 
tured to  wear  a  beard,  and  it  illustrates,  very 
impressively,  the  enormous  tyranny  of  usage, 
that,  though  no  one  denied  that  a  beard  was 
given  to  man  to  be  worn,  and  that  it  was  a 
real  protection  to  one  whose  duties  exposed 
him  to  the  severe  winters  of  Vermont,  Bishop 
Hopkins,  though  ecclesiastically  conservative, 
was  regarded  as  offensively  eccentric,  if  not 
theologically  unsound,  because  he  wore  one ! 
This  last  imputation  was  made  the  more 
swiftly  because  the  bishop,  in  the  construction 
of  his  episcopal  robes,  had  abandoned  the 
lawn  and  ruffled  sleeve,  and  had  substituted 
for  it  something  at  once  simpler,  cooler,  and 
less  costly. 


JSfsbop  Smitb  9 

But,  though  Bishop  Hopkins  was  Presiding 
Bishop  in  1866,  and  was  in  the  chair  when  I 
was  elected  secretary  of  the  House  of  Bishops, 
he  died  in  1868  ;  and  in  the  autumn  of  that 
year,  when  the  General  Convention  assembled 
in  New  York,  he  had  been  succeeded  by  the 
Right  Rev.  Benjamin  Bosworth  Smith,  D.D., 
the  Bishop  of  Kentucky. 

Bishop  Smith  was,  at  that  time,  in  the  thirty- 
sixth  year  of  his  episcopate,  having  been 
consecrated  in  1832,  together  with  Bishops  Mc- 
Ilvaine  and  George  W.  Doane,  as  well  as  with 
Bishop  John  Henry  Hopkins,  his  immediate 
predecessor  in  the  office  of  Presiding  Bishop. 
Bishop  Smith  continued  to  serve  as  Presiding 
Bishop  until  his  death,  in  May,  1884  ;  and  my 
own  consecration  in  October,  1883,  was>  °f  its 
kind,  his  last  official  act. 

He  was  born  in  Bristol,  Rhode  Island,  in 
1794,  and,  having  graduated  at  Brown  Univer- 
sity, became  rector  of  St.  Michael's  Church, 
Marblehead,  Mass.,  and,  two  years  later,  re- 
moved to  a  rectorship  in  Virginia.  Subse- 
quent to  this,  and  after  holding  cures  in 
Charlestown  and  Shepherdstown,  Va.,  he  re- 
moved to  Middlebury,  Vt,  and  from  thence, 
after  a  brief  ministry  in  Philadelphia,  to  Lex- 
ington, Ky.,  where,  in  1830,  he  became  rector 


io  JSisbop  Smitb 

of  Christ  Church.  Two  years  later  he  was 
chosen  and  consecrated  Bishop  of  Kentucky. 
From  this  it  will  be  seen  that,  as  people  were 
classified  in  those  days,  he  was  a  Northern 
man  called  to  exercise  his  episcopate  in  the 
South  in  what  was  then  a  slave-holding  com- 
munity. His  episcopate  spanned,  also,  a 
period  when,  from  causes  then  fiercely  oper- 
ative, but  now,  happily,  no  longer  existing, 
Churchmen  were  divided,  whether  Northerners 
or  Southerners,  into  two  schools,  equally  an- 
tagonistic and  contemptuous.  The  one  claimed 
piety,  simplicity,  and  scriptural  authority  as  its 
distinguishing  notes ;  and  the  other  glorified 
order,  reverence,  and  apostolic  tradition  as  its 
pre-eminent  distinctions  ;  and  neither  willingly 
lost  an  opportunity  of  disparaging  brethren  of 
the  same  household  of  faith,  with  whom  they 
were  proud  to  disagree. 

It  can  readily  be  understood  that  such  a 
situation  did  not  contribute  to  the  happiness 
of  a  bishop  whose  see  included  both  these  dis- 
cordant elements.  If  he  favoured  one  of  them, 
he  was  denounced  as  a  partisan ;  and  if  he 
favoured  neither  he  was  reviled  as  a  "trim- 
mer." Bishop  Smith  was  a  man  of  peace, 
gentle,  tolerant,  forbearing ;  and  a  very  emi- 
nent divine,  long  ago  gone  to  his  reward,  told 


Bfsbop  Smitb  n 

me  that,  at  a  time  when  bowing  at  the  name 
of  Jesus  in  the  Creed  was  considered  as  the 
note  of  an  extreme  school  in  the  Church, 
Bishop  Smith  might  be  observed  in  churches  in 
his  diocese  where  such  a  usage  prevailed  to  be 
in  a  state  of  gentle  oscillation  at  the  beginning 
of  the  Creed,  to  be  increasingly  so  as  the  second 
article  of  it  was  reached,  and,  thereafter,  grad- 
ually to  relapse  into  a  stationary  position.  I 
never  believed  this  story,  though  it  had  in  it 
a  mark  of  delicate  consideration  for  the  feelings 
of  others  which  one  could  well  understand. 

And  indeed,  in  this  kindlier  aspect  of  it,  it 
was  eminently  characteristic.  The  House  over 
which  Bishop  Smith  presided  contained  "many 
men  of  many  minds  "  ;  and  among  them  were 
those  from  whom  Bishop  Smith  strongly  and 
conscientiously  differed.  But  I  never  saw,  in 
his  bearing  or  action  toward  them,  as  a  presid- 
ing officer,  anything  but  the  most  absolute 
courtesy  and  equity.  In  his  theological  and 
ecclesiastical  views,  he  was,  undoubtedly,  dur- 
ing the  whole  period  of  his  office  as  chairman 
of  the  House,  in  a  minority.  But  in  his  re- 
cognition of  those  who  rose  to  speak,  and, 
most  of  all,  in  his  appointment  of  committees, 
he  was  invariably  just  and  generous.  As  he 
advanced  in  years,  the  task  of  making  such 


iz  DBisbop  Smitb 

appointments  became  to  him  somewhat  oner- 
ous, and  I  was  in  the  habit,  with  the  uncon- 
scious audacity  of  youth,  of  writing  out  the 
names  of  bishops  for  appointment  upon  special 
committees,  and  passing  them  up  to  his  desk. 
He  always  announced  them  with  unquestion- 
ing promptness ;  and  it  was  not  until  he  was 
succeeded  by  a  bishop  of  a  very  different  tem- 
per, when  my  committee  list  was  on  one  occa- 
sion returned  to  me  with  a  sharp  "  Will  not  do, 
at  all ! "  that  I  learned  how  great  my  presump- 
tion had  been. 

Bishop  Smith,  having  been  accorded  an  as- 
sistant for  the  work  of  the  episcopate  in  the 
Diocese  of  Kentucky,  came  to  live  in  New 
York  during  his  closing  years,  and  when  I 
rose  from  my  knees  after  having  knelt  to  re- 
ceive from  his  hands  my  episcopal  commission, 
he  closed  the  ordinal  from  which  he  had  been 
reading  the  words  of  consecration,  and  handed 
it  to  me,  saying,  "  There,  Henry,  you  can  keep 
that  book.  I  shall  never  use  it  again."  And 
he  never  did.  In  a  few  short  months,  his  work 
was  ended,  and  he  was  at  rest 


Bishop  mbittingbam 


II 
Bisfoop 


THE   RIGHT  REVEREND  DR.  WILLIAM    ROLLINSON 
WHITTINGHAM,  BISHOP  OF  MARYLAND 

ONE  of  the  most  interesting  and  pictur- 
esque figures  in  the  House  of  Bishops 
when  I  became  its  secretary  was  that  of  the 
Right  Reverend  Dr.  William  Rollinson  Whit- 
tingham,  then  the  Bishop  of  Maryland.  He 
sat  in  the  front  row  of  the  House,  the  seats 
and  desks  of  which  were  usually  arranged,  like 
those  in  the  United  States  Senate,  in  horse- 
shoe fashion  ;  and  when  I  assumed  the  duties 
of  my  office  as  secretary,  my  own  desk  or 
table,  raised  a  little  above  the  level  of  the  desks 
of  the  bishops,  enabled  me  to  look  down  upon 
the  bishops  in  the  front  row.  As  I  did  so,  I 
observed  that,  while  other  bishops  were  some- 
times engaged  in  writing  letters,  or  in  reading 
them,  or  other  papers  not  germane  to  the  busi- 
ness of  the  House,  Bishop  Whittingham  fol- 
lowed its  procedure  with  close  attention  ;  and, 

15 


16  Btsbop 

from  time  to  time,  made  entries  in  a  blank 
book  before  him. 

Suddenly  it  flashed  upon  me  that  the  bishop 
kept  a  record  of  the  business  of  the  House  ; 
and  so,  after  the  House  had  adjourned  for  the 
day,  I  went  to  him  with  the  question, 

"  I  beg  your  pardon,  sir,  but  do  you  keep  a 
journal  of  the  business  of  the  House  ?" 

"  Yes,"  replied  the  bishop  with  benignant 
courtesy,  "  such  is  my  custom." 

"  May  I  then,  sir,"  I  ventured  tremblingly  to 
ask,  "correct  my  minutes  from  yours?" 

"  Most  surely,  my  son,"  said  the  bishop,  with 
instant  perception  of  the  situation.  And  from 
that  day  on,  for  a  long  time,  and  until  I  had 
mastered  the  procedure  of  the  House,  and  had 
learned  how,  correctly,  to  keep  the  record  of 
its  business,  I  took  my  minutes,  at  the  close  of 
each  day's  sessions,  and  revised,  verified,  or 
amended  them,  according  to  this  precise  and 
unimpeachable  record. 

Precise  and  unimpeachable,  I  have  called 
Bishop  Whittingham's  methods,  and  I  doubt 
if  any  terms  more  accurately  describe  him.  He 
was  a  man,  especially  in  the  ecclesiastical 
realm,  not  only  of  wide  but  of  precise  learn- 
ing ;  and  I  doubt  if,  when  he  sat  in  the  House 
of  Bishops,  he  had  any  superior,  if  he  had  any 


Vfi 


i6 


frotii   ?.tnw  to  time,   m^i**   >T,;n»-8   sn  a  blank 

kept  a  record  «•»!  the  husintnan  o<  the  House  ; 
and  so,  nfr*-r  the  House  had  ad  jour  a?*)  »<x  the 
day,  T  \v<..ru  to  him  with  the  question. 

"  I  beg  your  pardon,  sir,  but  do  you  keep  a 
journal  of  the  business  of  the  House  ?" 

"  Yes,"  replied  the  bishop  with  benignant 
courtesy,  "  such  is  my  custom." 

"  May  I  then,  sir,"  I  ventured  tremblingly  to 
ask,  "  c  The  Right  ReveneiyWs  ?  " 

Doctor  William  Rollin son  Whitftisigtonifcith 
Bishop  of  Maryland.  And  from 
that  day  on,i*w»ai;pH^wp*iW«w  Yiork. 
mastered  the  procedure  of  the  House,  and  had 
learned  how,  correct !y,  to  keep  the  record  of 
its  business,  }  took  my  minutes,  at  the  close  of 
each  day's  sessions,  and  revised,  verified,  or 
amended  them,  according  to  this  precise  and 
unimpeachable  record. 

Precise  and  unimpeachable,  I  have  called 
Bishop  Whittingham's  methods,  and  I  doubt 
if  any  terms  more  accurately  describe  him  Hz 
was  a  man,  especially  in  the  «*cc!«»iastical 
realm,  not  only  of  wide  but  of  precise  learn- 
ing ;  and  I  doubt  if,  when  he  sat  in  the  House 
of  Bishops,  he  had  any  superior,  If  hr  had  any 


Bfsbop  MbfttlnQbam  17 

peer,  in  this  particular.  A  bishop  who  had 
quoted  a  pre-Reformation  Archbishop  of  Can- 
terbury in  support  of  an  argument  he  was 
making,  was  interrupted  by  Bishop  Whitting- 
ham  who  said,  "  I  beg  my  brother's  pardon. 
But  he  quoted  an  Archbishop  of  Canterbury 
as  having  said  "  so  and  so  ;  "  did  he  not  mean 

Archbishop ?  "  repeating  a   name  which, 

evidently,  no  one  present  recalled,  but  making 
a  correction  which,  as  obviously,  no  one  pre- 
sent ventured  to  contradict. 

But  such  impressive  illustrations  of  unusual 
learning  were  accompanied  by  characteristics 
which,  very  often,  accompany  it.  Bishop 
Whittingham  had  been  a  theological  profes- 
sor, and  to  the  end  he  retained  peculiarities 
not  unfamiliar  in  such  a  calling.  Born  in  New 
York  in  1805,  and  graduated  at  the  General 
Theological  Seminary  in  1825,  he  returned, 
after  brief  rectorships  in  Orange,  N.  }„,  and  at 
St.  Luke's  Church,  New  York,  to  the  General 
Theological  Seminary  as  a  professor,  less  than 
six  years  after  his  ordination  to  the  priest- 
hood ;  and  though  his  service  as  a  professor 
only  extended  a  little  more  than  five  years,  he 
took  into  the  episcopate  that  exceptional  de- 
votion to  letters  and  that  extraordinary  energy 
in  the  pursuit  of  ecclesiastical  learning  which 


1 8  JStsbop  'CClbitttnobam 

always  distinguished  him.  His  library  was  a 
treasure-house  of  rare  and  choice  works ;  and 
his  acquaintance  with  them,  happily  furthered 
by  conditions  more  favourable  than  those  of 
most  of  his  episcopal  brethren,  and  less  inter- 
rupted by  the  exactions  of  long  journeys, 
and  frequent  absences  from  his  desk,  gave 
him  a  pre-eminence  in  classical,  critical,  and 
Biblical  learning,  which  no  one  ventured  to 
dispute. 

But  in  the  exhibition  of  these  he  was  handi- 
capped by  characteristics  at  which  I  have  al- 
ready hinted.  It  is  a  law  of  the  Church  that 
the  testimonials,  character,  and  qualifications 
of  a  bishop-elect  shall,  before  his  election  is 
confirmed  by  a  majority  of  the  bishops,  be 
considered  and  discussed — if  his  election  shall 
happen  to  have  occurred  within  six  months 
of  a  General  Convention — in  the  House  of 
Bishops ;  and,  as  that  House  sits  with  closed 
doors,  the  discussions,  on  such  occasions,  are 
apt  to  be  quite  informal. 

It  happened,  on  one  occasion,  that  a  recent 
episcopal  election  had  come  up  for  review; 
and  questions  as  to  the  bishop-elect  were  being 
asked,  and  answered,  with  considerable  free- 
dom. A  bishop  who  knew  the  bishop-elect  in  a 
very  intimate  way  was  on  his  feet  and  was 


JSisbop  THHbittincibam  19 

being  catechised,  when  a  bishop  called  out, 
"  What  kind  of  wife  has  our  brother-elect  ?  " 

"His  present  wife  — "  began  the  bishop 
thus  challenged,  when  the  Bishop  of  Maryland 
sprang  to  his  feet. 

"  One  moment !  "  he  cried.  "  Do  I  under- 
stand my  brother  aright  ?  Did  he  say  '  his 
present  wife,'  and  am  I  to  understand  that, 
by  that  phrase,  he  means  to  imply  that  the 
brother-elect  has  had  a  previous  wife  ?  Be- 
cause, if  so,  I  cannot  vote  for  his  confirmation. 
St.  Paul  says  '  A  bishop  must  be  the  husband 
of  one  wife,' "  quoting  a  verse  from  the  ist 
Epistle  to  Timothy1  which  scholars  usually 
regard  as  designed  to  forbid,  in  an  age  in 
which  the  usage  prevailed,  polygamic  unions. 

For  a  moment  the  House,  in  which  were  a 
number  of  bishops  who,  having  been  bereaved 
of  their  earthly  partners,  had  supplied  their 
places,  sat  still  in  stunned  silence,  until  a  pre- 
late, whose  sense  of  humour  was  as  keen  as 
Bishop  Whittingham's  was  feeble,  rose  in  his 
place  and  said,  "  Do  I  understand  the  Bishop 
of  Maryland  as  regarding  the  language  of  the 
Apostle  which  he  has  just  quoted  as  manda- 
tory?" 

"  Certainly,"    exclaimed    Bishop   Whitting- 

1 1  Timothy  iii.,  2. 


20  Sisbop  Wbitttngbam 

ham,  not  detecting  the  trap  that  had  been  laid 
for  him. 

"  Very  well,  then,  Mr.  Chairman,"  said  the 
interrogating  bishop  blandly ;  "if  the  Bishop 
of  Maryland  regards  the  language  of  St.  Paul, 
when  he  says  that  a  bishop  must  be  the  hus- 
band of  one  wife,  as  mandatory,  I  would  like 
to  ask  him  what  he  proposes  to  do  with  the 

Bishop  of [naming  a  bachelor  bishop] 

who  has  n't  any  ?  " 

There  was  a  shout  of  laughter,  amid  which 
the  Bishop  of  Maryland  flushed  angrily,  and 
took  his  seat.  The  humour  of  his  blunder  was 
wholly  unperceived  by  him. 

But  the  absence  of  these  lighter  qualities  did 
not  detract  from  a  nobility  of  character  which 
had  in  it  features  that  were  singularly  engag- 
ing. Bishop  Whittingham,  like  others  of  his 
school  and  his  traditions,  had,  in  his  earlier 
episcopate,  a  somewhat  pugnacious  tenacity 
for  his  episcopal  rights  and  privileges.  It 
was  said  that  he  always  insisted,  at  any  ser- 
vice where  it  was  said,  on  pronouncing  the 
Absolution.  As  to  this  there  was,  and  I  sup- 
pose still  is, — though  I  am  bound  to  say  that  I 
have  never  encountered  it, — a  conviction  on  the 
part  of  certain  presbyters  that,  except  in  the 
service  of  the  Holy  Communion,  it  was  their 


Bisbop  IWlbittingbam  21 

right,  and  not  the  bishop's,  to  pronounce  the 
Absolution.  The  matter  was  one,  I  have  been 
told,  of  sharp  contention  between  the  bishop 
and  a  distinguished  priest  in  his  chief  city, 
whenever  the  bishop  came  to  the  church  of  the 
latter  on  an  episcopal  visitation.  But  at  length, 
after  many  years  of  such  dissension,  the  rector 
concluded  that,  at  best,  the  question  was  im- 
material, and  said  so. 

"  You  may  say  the  Absolution,  Bishop,  if 
you  want  to,"  he  promptly  remarked  to  the 
bishop  when  the  latter  appeared  in  the  rector's 
vestry-room.  "  But  I  don't  want  to,  "  ex- 
claimed the  bishop,  who  had,  still  earlier, 
reached  a  conclusion  identical  with  the  rec- 
tor's. And  no  one  who  knew  him  could  doubt 
how  much  that  conclusion  had  cost  him.  Like 
most  men  of  great  gifts,  he  was  a  person  of  rare 
modesty  ;  and  no  one  who  could  understand 
him  could  be  ignorant  how  much  pain  it  gave 
him  to  contend  for  a  prerogative,  nor  how  much, 
when  loyalty  to  a  principle  obliged  him  to  con- 
tend for  it,  to  surrender  it.  But,  as  he  ripened 
in  years,  his  vision  expanded,  rather  than  con- 
tracted, and  so  it  came  to  pass  that  among 
those  who  knew  him  latest  were  those  who 
loved  him  best. 


Bishop  Williams 


Ill 
Williams 

THE     RIGHT     REVEREND     DR.      JOHN     WILLIAMS, 

BISHOP    OF    CONNECTICUT,    AND    SOMETIME 

PRESIDING    BISHOP 

THESE  recollections  would  very  inaccu- 
rately portray  the  life  of  the  Episcopal 
Church  during  the  latter  half  of  the  nineteenth 
century  if  they  attempted  to  ignore  the  dif- 
ferent schools,  or  indeed  "  parties,"  as  one 
might  venture  to  call  them,  into  which  the 
Church  was  divided  through  a  large  part  of 
that  time.  To  do  so  would  be  to  misrepresent 
the  history  of  religious  opinions,  during  a  very 
interesting  and  critical  period  in  American 
Church  history  ;  and  to  ignore  influences  that 
have  been,  and  will  continue  to  be,  pre-em- 
inently potent  in  affecting  religious  beliefs. 
The  American  mind,  even  farther  back  than 
1850,  had  come,  in  the  case  of  many  thoughtful 
and  educated  people,  to  realise  that  the  English 
Reformation,  like  most  movements  of  its  kind, 
had  illustrated  considerable  exaggeration  ;  and, 

25 


26  JSisbop  Williams 

in  throwing  overboard  the  corruptions  and 
tyrannies  of  the  papacy,  had,  sometimes,  only 
exchanged  one  form  of  ecclesiastical  imperial- 
ism for  another.  It  was  this  conviction  which, 
after  the  first  triumphs  of  Puritanism  in 
America,  produced  a  reaction  that  was  im- 
patient of  an  authority  that  intruded,  often, 
into  the  domain  of  things  aSidtpopa ;  and  that, 
while  claiming  large  freedoms  for  conscience, 
for  the  individual  disciple,  only  exchanged 
one  bondage  for  another. 

It  was  this  that  went  a  long  way  to  explain 
the  growth  of  the  Church  in  Connecticut ;  and 
which  accounted  for  the  evolution  of  a  type  of 
Churchmanship,  there,  which  it  must  be  owned, 
as  it  awakened,  elsewhere,  a  certain  envy,  de- 
veloped in  Connecticut  Churchmen  a  decided 
complacency.  To  be  known  as  a  "  Connecticut 
Churchman "  was  to  be  ticketed  as  a  person 
who  held  reverent  views  of  authority,  conserva- 
tive ideas  of  worship,  and,  pre-eminently, 
orthodox  opinions  about  dogma.  The  late 
Bishop  of  Connecticut  once  told  me  a  story  of 
his  venerable  predecessor,  and  the  late  Bishop 
of  Rhode  Island,  which  curiously  illustrates 
this.  At  the  time  that  Bishop  Brownell  was 
Bishop  of  Connecticut,  Bishop  Williams  was 
his  Assistant,  and  Bishop  Clark  —  then  the 


a*  Blsbop  Williams 

in  throwing  overboard  the  corruptions  and 
tyrannies  of  the  papacy,  had,  sometimes,  only 
exchanged  one  form  of  ecclesiastical  imperial- 
ism for  another.  It  was  this  conviction  which. 
after  the  first  triumphs  of  Puritanism  in 
America,  produced  a  reaction  that  was  im- 
patient of  an  authority  that  intruded,  often, 
into  the  domain  of  things  dtiid<popa ;  and  that, 
while  claiming  large  freedoms  for  conscience, 
for  the  individual  disciple,  only  exchanged 
one  bondage  for  another. 

The  ^Right^R^¥fef*ndi  B)ck?ittf  tofrnt<Wii|tia»i 
h  ."Bfehof*  bfCbrttte^tiGUt'.v-ticut ;  and 

'•  '.  From  R  phr.totnar'h  t»y  1 1  cniiipu  Pro-;.,  Mi4dlt*bwft,l$qMi.  of 

Churchmanship,  there,  which  it  must  be  owned, 
as  it  awakened,  elsewhere,  a  certain  envy,  de- 
velojHtd  in  Connecticut  Churchmen  a  decided 
complacency.  To  be  known  as  a  "  Connecticut 
Churchman  "  was  to  be  ticketed  as  a  person 
who  held  reverent  views  of  authority,  conserva- 
tive ideas  of  worship,  and,  pre-eminently, 
orthodox  opinions  about  dogma.  The  late 
Bishop  of  Connecticut  once  told  me  a  story  of 
his  venerable  predecessor,  and  the  late  Bishop 
of  Rhode  Island,  which  curiously  illustrates 
this.  At  the  time  that  Bishop  Brownell  wns 
Bishop  of  Connecticut,  Bishop  Williams  was 
his  Assistant,  and  Bishop  Clark  —  then  the 


JStebop  Williams  27 

Rev.  Dr.  Thomas  M.  Clark  —  was  the  rector 
of  a  church  in  Hartford,  in  which  city  all 
three  happened,  one  Sunday  morning,  to  be. 
After  morning  service,  Bishop  Brownell  and 
Bishop  Williams  chanced  to  meet.  Bishop 
Brownell,  it  should  be  said,  was  born  in  Massa- 
chusetts, and  had  been  reared  under  influences 
which  certainly  had  not  dislodged  earlier  im- 
pressions;  for,  though  he  graduated  at  Union 
College  (in  1804),  and  had  been  tutor,  lecturer, 
and  professor  there  during  the  presidency  of 
Eliphalet  Nott,  he  had  not  learned,  any  more 
than  had  his  great  preceptor,  to  disesteem  New 
England  ideas  of  orthodoxy.  In  his  own  presi- 
dency, as  first  in  that  office  at  Washington  (now 
Trinity)  College,  and,  later,  in  his  episcopate, 
when  he  was  Bishop  of  Connecticut,  Bishop 
Brownell  was  the  incarnation  of  traditional 
orthodoxy  ;  and  unfamiliar  views  of  truth  had, 
to  him,  a  very  menacing  and  heterodox  sound. 
On  the  occasion  to  which  I  refer,  he  came 
in  upon  Bishop  Williams  somewhat  unexpect- 
edly ;  and  the  latter,  not  unnaturally,  en- 
quired, "  Where  have  you  been  this  morning, 
Bishop?"  "Down  at  Christ  Church,"  an- 
swered Bishop  Brownell,  "  where  I  heard  Clark. 
He  preached  pantheism  ;  but  he  did  n't  know 
it ! "  If  Dr.  Clark's  sermon  could  be  disin- 


28  JSfsbop  lUilliams 

terred  to-day,  it  is  doubtful  whether  the  most 
critical  eye  could  detect  in  it  any  savour  of 
pantheism  ;  but  Connecticut  standards  in  those 
days  were  both  narrow  and  austere. 

That,  among  Congregationalists,  this  was 
pre-eminently  the  case  was  doubtless,  in  part, 
the  explanation  of  the  step  that  young  John 
Williams  took  when  he  forsook  that  fellow- 
ship. He  was  born  in  Deerfield,  Mass.,  in 
1817,  and  his  ancestry  was  alike  gifted  and 
distinguished. 

"  His  father  "  (I  quote  the  admirable  sketch  of  Bishop 
Williams  by  the  Rev.  Dr.  Samuel  Hart  in  the  Church- 
man of  February  18,  1899)  "was  Ephraim  Williams, 
who  was  born  in  1760,  the  year  of  the  accession  of 
George  III.  He  was  well  known  as  a  lawyer,  and  in 
public  life,  beginning  practice  as  a  partner  of  Theodore 
Sedgwick  in  Stockbridge.  Through  his  grandmother, 
the  bishop  was  also  descended  from  the  Reverend  John 
Cotton,  the  first  minister  of  Boston,  and  the  Reverend 
Solomon  Stoddard  of  Northampton.  " 

The  bishop's  mother,  for  many  years  a  familiar 
figure  in   Middletown     during    his    residence 
there,  was  Emily  Trowbridge,  much  younger 
than  her  husband  and  long  outliving  him. 
John  Williams,  her  son,  says  Dr.  Hart, 

"  was  prepared  for  college  in  the  academies  at  Deerfield 
and  Northfield,  Mass.,  and  was  entered  at  Harvard  Col- 


JSfsbop  Williams  29 

lege  in  1831,  when  he  had  just  completed  his  fourteenth 
year.  His  parents  had  been  Unitarians  ;  but  the  young 
man,  while  at  Harvard,  largely  owing  to  the  influence 
of  the  Reverend  Benjamin  Davis  Winslow,  after  much 
discussion  and  study,  became,  in  his  convictions,  a 
Churchman." 

No  fact  in  the  life  of  Bishop  Williams  is 
more  interesting  than  this  change,  and  the 
circumstances  under  which  it  came  to  pass. 
The  atmosphere  in  which,  as  a  youth  at  Har- 
vard, he  found  himself  was  not  merely  cold, 
but  dry  ;  and  there  was  in  the  youth  an  intel- 
lectual element  which  he  never  outgrew.  It 
was  not  conspicuous  in  his  public  or  private 
utterances,  but  it  was  revealed  alike  in  his 
reading  and  in  his  friendships ;  and  no  one  can 
recall  the  little  volume  which,  in  1844,  he 
issued  from  the  parsonage  of  St.  George's 
Church,  Schenectady,  N.  Y.,  while  he  was  the 
rector  of  that  parish,  which  bore  the  title, 
Ancient  Hymns  of  Holy  Church,  and  which 
was  dedicated  to  his  friend  the  Rev.  Arthur 
Cleveland  Coxe,  "  in  memory,"  to  quote  his 
own  words,  "  of  many  conversations  on  the 
sacred  ritual  of  the  Church  of  God  " — no  one, 
I  say,  can  recall  this  page  in  his  history  with- 
out recognising  that,  in  the  Church  to  which 
he  turned  in  his  youth,  and  which  he  was  to 


30  JSfsbop  Williams 

adorn  by  his  eminent  services  in  its  episcopate, 
he  found,  of  necessity,  his  intellectual  and  spir- 
itual home. 

In  that  home  it  was  no  less  natural  that  he 
should  speedily  be  called  to  a  position  of  large 
influence  and  of  intellectual  dignity.  In  1848 
he  was  chosen  to  be  President  of  Trinity  Col- 
lege, "  the  youngest  person,  it  is  believed," 
says  Dr.  Hart,  "  ever  chosen  to  be  head  of  a 
college."  This  is  not  quite  true,  even  in  con- 
temporaneous history  ;  for  Eliphalet  Nott  was 
no  older,  if  as  old,  when  chosen  President 
of  Union  College,  and  a  grandson  of  his, 
whose  modesty  forbids  my  naming  him,  was 
called  to  the  same  eminence  when  only  twenty- 
six  years  of  age.  But  the  distinction  in  the 
case  of  Dr.  John  Williams  consisted  in  what 
some  one  has  called  "  the  curious  ripeness  of 
his  youth "  ;  and  in  qualities  of  vision  and 
prudence,  rarely  found  except  as  the  notes  of 
middle  life  or  advanced  age. 

It  was  not  surprising  that  the  exceptional 
illustration  of  such  qualities,  in  his  brilliant 
career  as  the  President  of  Trinity  College, 
should  have  turned  towards  him  the  attention 
of  the  Diocese  of  Connecticut,  when,  in  1850,  it 
attempted,  and,  in  1851,  succeeded,  in  electing 
an  assistant  to  its  venerable  bishop.  Dr.  Wil- 


Bisbop  TIBliUfams  31 

Hams  was  elected  by  a  very  large  majority  both 
of  the  clerical  and  lay  votes  ;  was  consecrated 
in  St.  John's  Church,  Hartford,  on  October 
29th,  and  there  began  an  episcopate  of  alto- 
gether exceptional  influence  and  power. 

This  was  by  no  means  because  he  dis- 
esteemed  the  traditions  which  were  behind  him, 
or  sought  to  replace  them  with  others.  He 
did  neither.  Retaining  his  connection  with 
Trinity  College  for  some  two  years,  he  became 
a  year  later,  and  remained  until  his  death, 
the  head  of  the  Berkeley  Divinity  School  at 
Middletown,  Conn.,  of  which  he  was  not  only 
the  founder,  but,  though  surrounded  with  able 
associates  for  nearly  half  a  century,  the  su- 
preme inspiration.  It  would  be  as  interesting 
as  it  would  be  impossible  to  catalogue  the  men 
and  ideas  that  he  formed  and  disseminated ; 
and  though  many  of  his  pupils  travelled  far 
afield,  in  the  sense  of  any  slavish  adherence  to 
the  views  and  view-points  in  which  he  had  nur- 
tured them,  there  was  —  there  is  —  no  one  of 
them  whose  mind  will  ever  lose  the  impress  of 
his  thought.  His  own  intellectual  activities 
were  so  vigorous  and  so  scholarly  that  he  com- 
pelled his  students  to  think ;  and  held  them 
fast  to  traditions  whose  potency,  though  they 
were  often  quite  unconscious  of  the  fact, 


32  JBfsbop  tamtams 

resided  largely  in  his  own  unique  and  attrac- 
tive personality. 

My  own  acquaintance  with  him  began  when 
I  was  a  child,  and  he  then  rector  of  St. 
George's  Church,  Schenectady,  N.  Y.  My 
father  was  then  a  professor  in  Union  College  ; 
and  Mr.  Williams  (as  he  then  was)  ministered 
in  St.  George's  to  a  congregation  which  in- 
cluded a  row  of  small  boys,  of  whom  I  was  one. 
I  blush  to  say  that  I  cannot  recall  his  preach- 
ing— but  those  were  not  days  in  which  child- 
ren were  considered  in  the  Church's  services, 
being  mainly  under  discipline  as  "  unruly  mem- 
bers" of  the  congregation  whose  chief  office 
there  was  to  sit  still.  Years  afterward,  how- 
ever, when,  as  a  young  rector,  I  became  secre- 
tary of  the  House  of  Bishops,  it  was  Bishop 
Williams  who  nominated  me,  and  to  him  I 
owed  much  kindness  and  generous  forbear- 
ance in  connection  with  the  earlier  crudeness 
and  manifold  imperfections  of  my  secretarial 
efforts. 

When  I  took  up  those  tasks,  Bishop  Williams 
had  sat  in  the  House  of  Bishops  for  a  quarter 
of  a  century ;  and  was  one  of  its  most  com- 
manding figures.  He  spoke  but  rarely,  and 
briefly;  but  when  he  spoke,  all  men  listened, 
and  his  utterances  were  always  ad  rem,  and 


Btsbop  Williams  33 

exceptionally  illuminating.  No  one,  in  my 
experience  of  it,  had  a  more  accurate  know- 
ledge of  the  history  of  legislation  in  the  House 
of  Bishops  ;  and  no  one,  as  it  seemed  to  me, 
was  able  to  deal  with  delicate  and  intricate 
questions  more  dispassionately.  Before  he 
ceased  to  have  a  seat  in  the  House  he  had  be- 
come Presiding  Bishop  ;  and  in  that  capacity 
illustrated  the  highest  qualities  of  a  presiding 
officer.  There  have  been  chairmen  of  ecclesi- 
astical bodies  who  constantly  recalled  a  very 
noble  old  divine,  the  Rev.  Dr.  Levi  Bull,  who 
presided  in  the  convention  that  elected  my 
father  Bishop  of  Pennsylvania.  It  is  told  that 
Dr.  Bull,  having  on  one  occasion  put  a  ques- 
tion to  the  Convention  of  the  Diocese  of  Penn- 
sylvania, and  having  had  a  loud  response  to 
his  request,  "Those  in  favour  of  the  resolution 
will  say  aye,"  at  once  declared  the  resolution 
carried.  "  But,  Doctor,"  said  a  grave  divine, 
rising  in  his  place,  "  you  have  n't  called  for  the 
noes  f"  "  Oh,  well,"  said  the  doctor,  "we  dorit 
want  any  noes"  There  have  been  chairmen  and 
presiding  bishops  in  the  House  who  recalled 
Dr.  Bull — though  theynever dispensed  so  cheer- 
fully with  the  ordinary  rules  of  deliberative 
bodies  !  But  in  Bishop  Williams's  case,  when 
he  presided  in  the  House,  his  regard  for  the 


34  JSisbop  Williams 

Rules  of  Order  was  most  scrupulous  ;  and  one 
never  knew,  unless  one  chose  to  infer  it  from 
previous  associations,  utterances,  or  inherit- 
ances, on  which  side  of  any  particular  question 
were  his  personal  sympathies.  In  a  word,  he 
was  a  most  impartial  presiding  officer  ;  never  a 
partisan,  never  a  limp  creature  of  the  impulse  of 
the  moment ;  courteous,  but  firm ;  and  amid 
the  confusions  of  debate  often  bringing  order 
out  of  chaos,  by  a  few  unimpassioned  but 
illuminating  sentences. 

In  a  word,  this  rare  scholar,  teacher,  and 
prelate  united  with  gifts  which  would  have 
made  him  illustrious  in  any  of  these  walks  of 
life  others  which,  rarer  in  their  moral  quality, 
were  the  pre-eminent  enrichments  of  a  noble 
character.  And  crowning  them  all  was  a  note 
of  Doric  dignity  and  simplicity,  which  was  the 
fit  capital  of  so  strong  and  stately  a  column. 
In  an  estimate  of  his  character  now  some  six 
or  seven  years  old,  I  find  that  I  have  empha- 
sised that  aspect  of  Bishop  Williams,  and  I 
venture  to  repeat  it  here. 

"  BISHOP  WILLIAMS: 
"  HIS  DIRECTNESS  AND  SIMPLICITY 

"  If  I  were  asked  to  indicate  what,  among  other  things, 
of  which  others  will  doubtless  speak,  always  impressed 


3Bisbop  Williams  35 

me,  in  the  late  Bishop  of  Connecticut,  I  should  say  his 
directness  and  simplicity.  I  wrote  him,  often,  in  one  or 
other  of  those  perplexities  in  which  we  all  turned  to  him; 
and  his  answer,  or  counsel,  was  always  clear,  candid,  ex- 
plicit. If  he  did  not  know,  he  frankly  said  he  did  not 
know.  If  he  had  an  opinion  or  conviction,  he  as  frankly 
uttered  it.  In  a  sermon,  yesterday,  delivered  on  the 
birthday  of  the  latter,  I  ventured  to  bracket  him  with 
Lincoln — the  two  so  unlike  in  their  traditions  and  train- 
ing, so  often  like  in  their  unadorned  and  columnar 
directness  and  simplicity.  Bishop  Williams's  pine  coffin 
and  plain  black  suit  were  fine  notes  of  his  impatience  of 
costly  ornament  or  personal  display.  No  more  beautiful 
example  has  been  given  to  the  Church  than  his  modest 
home,  his  frugal  and  inexpensive  surroundings,  his  large 
indifference  to  the  decorative  and  the  ornamental.  His 
learning,  his  rare  power  (the  two  things  are  by  no  means 
identical)  of  imparting  learning;  his  unwearied  devotion 
to  the  work  of  his  great  office;  his  tenacity  of  opinion, 
or,  rather,  conviction,  in  matters  of  the  Faith,  coupled 
with  a  noble  charity, — I  wish  I  could  violate  the  privacy 
of  others  and  illustrate  this, — toward  those  who  differed 
from  him;  his  stately  presence;  his  power  in  the  pulpit; 
his  influence  over  men, — all  these  the  Church  has  large 
reason  gratefully  to  remember.  But  not  less,  in  an  age 
over-given  to  ostentation,  tawdriness,  and  mere  orna- 
mentation in  men's  worship  and  persons,  has  it  reason  to 
hold  in  grateful  memory  the  consistent  example  which 
he  gave  us  all  of  masculine  and  dignified  simplicity." 

These  reminiscences  would  be  incomplete  if 
I  did  not  enrich  them  with  the  memories  of 
pupils  of  Bishop  Williams ;  and  two  of  them 


36  JSisbop  tamtams 

have  given  me  some  memorabilia  of  their 
college  or  seminary  days.  The  first  of  these  is 
from  the  pen  of  the  Rev.  Horace  B.  Hitchings, 
D.D.,  a  graduate  of  Trinity  College,  and  later 
a  presbyter  in  the  Diocese  of  New  York. 

"  You  honour  me  greatly  in  asking  for  reminiscences 
of  the  late  Bishop  Williams  for  your  forthcoming  book. 
You  little  know,  however,  how  great  a  favour  you  ask. 
My  remembrances  of  that  great  and  good  man  are 
among  my  most  sacred  treasures,  and  it  seems  almost 
profane  to  write  any  of  them  out  for  other  eyes  to  see,  or 
other  minds  to  know. 

"  For  some  reason  incomprehensible  to  me,  the  bishop 
allowed  me  to  come  in  close  contact  with  himself  ;  and 
after  a  time  the  relationship  was  more  in  the  nature  of 
confident  and  loving  friendship,  than  of  teacher  and 
pupil,  or  of  bishop  and  priest.  The  intimacy,  however, 
was  never  of  the  sort  that  breeds  contempt.  The  closer 
it  became,  and  the  more  I  learned  of  the  character  and 
disposition  and  aspirations  of  the  man,  the  greater,  and 
nobler,  and  holier,  he  seemed  to  be. 

"  Never  shall  I  forget  the  first  time  I  met  the  bishop 
face  to  face.  I  was  but  a  boy,  just  entering  Trinity  Col- 
lege,|of  which  he  was  president.  A  room  had  been  assigned 
me.  A  perfect  stranger  to  both  students  and  professors, 
in  loneliness  and  heart-heavy  with  homesickness,  I  was 
arranging  the  little  furniture  I  possessed  to  make  it  com- 
fortable. A  rap  came  upon  the  door.  I  was  alarmed, 
and  having  heard  much  of  the  trying  scenes  a  freshman 
was  expected  to  go  through,  I  supposed  my  time  had 
come.  I  opened  the  door  cautiously,  and  to  my  great 
astonishment  there  stood  the  president.  I  know  not 


3Bisbop  Williams  37 

which  possessed  me  most,  awe  or  fear.  What  breach  of 
college  discipline  had  I  been  guilty  of,  that  the  president 
should  be  after  me,  so  soon  ?  I  never  dreamed  that  he 
had  come  to  make  a  friendly  call ;  but  never  shall  I  for- 
get the  kind  words  he  spoke,  nor  with  what  interest  he 
asked  after  my  comfort.  Surely  I  could  no  longer  feel 
a  stranger  or  lonely,  for  I  was  certain  of  a  friend  in  no 
less  a  person  than  the  president  himself.  Those  kind 
words  warmed  my  heart,  and  filled  me  with  a  love  that 
made  college  life  a  delight,  and  has  caused  it  ever  since 
to  be  a  memory  most  sweet  to  look  back  upon. 

"  It  is  hardly  proper,  perhaps,  to  relate  the  incidents 
of  college  life.  The  frolics  and  pranks  of  students  are 
trifling  and  foolish  enough,  at  best,  but  from  some  of 
them  the  character  and  good  heart  of  our  president  was 
made  manifest.  He  never  forgot  that  he  had  once  been 
a  boy.  That,  I  believe,  was  the  secret  of  his  successful 
management  of  the  college  ;  and  of  his  extraordinary 
influence  over  young  men,  even  in  his  advancing  years. 

"  It  was  the  custom  of  those  in  authority  to  sell  the 
grass  on  the  campus  to  some  farmer  in  the  neighbourhood. 
It  was  also  the  custom  of  the  students  to  destroy  as 
much  of  the  hay  made  from  it  as  was  possible,  usually 
by  setting  it  on  fire.  On  one  occasion  a  trusting  and 
confiding  farmer  left  a  load  of  hay  on  his  cart  to  stand 
on  the  campus  over  night.  A  great  opportunity  was 
open  for  the  students  to  have  fun.  The  president  was 
certain  advantage  would  be  taken  of  it,  and  so  watched 
to  see  what  would  be  done  with  the  hay.  He  had  a  cap 
and  suit  of  clothes  much  like  those  the  students  wore. 
These  he  donned,  and  waited  patiently  among  the  trees 
in  the  grove.  About  eleven  at  night,  the  students — 
some  of  the  mischievous  ones — began  to  gather.  The 


38  JSisbop  tamtams 

night  was  dark,  it  was  quite  impossible  to  recognise 
friends  from  foes,  so  the  president  joined  the  crowd.  It 
was  the  intention  of  the  students  to  dump  the  hay,  cart 
and  all,  into  the  river  running  in  the  rear  of  the  college 
grounds,  and  thus  give  the  hay  a  dose  of  water  instead 
of  fire,  as  it  had  been  strictly  forbidden  them  to  do. 
The  president  followed  in  the  rear,  and  just  as  the  edge 
of  the  bank  was  reached  and  they  were  about  to  let  go 
the  cart,  in  his  natural  voice  he  said,  '  Come,  boys,  I 
guess  we  have  hauled  this  hay  far  enough.  Let  us  go  to 
our  rooms.'  Such  a  scattering  as  there  was  of  the  boys 
was  never  seen  before  on  college  grounds  ;  and  such 
fear  and  trembling  as  there  was  among  some  of  the 
students  the  next  day  will  be  long  remembered  by  them. 
That  was  the  last  of  it,  however  ;  no  student  was  called 
up  or  disciplined.  The  suspense,  the  fear  and  trem- 
bling for  hours  was  punishment  enough.  But  the  inci- 
dent, and  treatment  of  it,  won  the  hearts  and  respect  of 
the  students  for  the  president  ever  after. 

"On  another  occasion  a  different  phase  of  the  presi- 
dent's character  was  brought  out  when  the  hay  was  put  in 
the  college  chapel,  thus  making  the  chapel  unfit  for  use 
at  the  hour  of  morning  prayer.  Not  a  word  was  said 
about  the  matter  during  the  day,  no  inquiries  were  made 
as  to  who  did  the  mischief.  A  dead  and  dreaded  silence 
was  observed.  The  chapel  was  cleared  out,  and  cleaned 
up.  The  students  assembled  as  usual  for  evening 
prayers.  The  president,  though  contrary  to  his  custom, 
officiated.  Before  commencing  the  service,  however, 
he  addressed  the  students  in  tones  full  of  sorrow,  and 
told  how  pained  he  was  to  find  there  were  any  present 
who  had  so  little  respect  for  that  sacred  place  as  to 
desecrate  it  in  the  manner  in  which  it  was  desecrated 


JSfsbop  Williams  39 

the  night  before.  He  did  not  know,  and  did  not  want 
to  know  who  the  guilty  ones  were,  but  trusted  the  act 
was  one  of  thoughtless  levity,  rather  than  a  deliberate 
act  of  sacrilege.  '  The  Lord  is  in  His  Holy  Temple  ; 
let  all  the  earth  keep  silence  before  Him.'  There  was 
not  a  student  present,  whether  guilty  or  not,  whose  soul 
was  not  touched  by  the  president's  tone  and  reverent 
words,  and  who  was  not  heartily  ashamed  of  the 
thoughtless  prank.  I  doubt  whether  any  college  chapel 
service  was  ever  joined  in  by  the  whole  body  of  students 
more  earnestly  and  devoutly  than  was  that  evening 
prayer.  A  solemn  stillness  and  holy  awe  seemed  to  per- 
vade the  place,  and  mark  it  indeed  as  a  sacred  spot. 
It  is  needless  to  say  the  chapel  was  ever  after  unmolested. 
"  On  one  occasion  the  president  told  me  he  was  sitting 
at  his  window  during  a  heavy  thunder-storm.  The  rain 
came  down  in  torrents.  Great  was  his  surprise  to  see  a 
student,  one  of  the  model  students  at  that,  bareheaded 
and  in  his  dressing-gown  and  slippers,  running  across 
the  campus  with  a  water  pitcher  in  his  hand.  What  can 
the  boy  be  up  to  ?  he  thought.  He  watched,  and  saw 
him  climb  to  the  top  of  a  low  building  near  by,  empty 
his  water  pitcher,  and  run  back  again.  What  did  it  all 
mean  After  the  storm  was  over  Professor  B.,  who  was 
making  observations  of  the  fall  of  rain  for  the  United 
States  Weather  Bureau,  came  to  the  president's  room 
and  reported  the  greatest  fall  of  water  of  which  he  had 
ever  heard.  '  I  have  searched  the  records  for  years 
back.  There  was  nothing  ever  like  it.  So  many  inches 
of  water  in  so  many  minutes.'  The  secret  of  the  stu- 
dent's water  pitcher  was  out;  but  the  president  kept  his 
counsel.  'Professor,  I  think  I  would  not  make  an  official 
report  of  this  storm  until  I  had  looked  into  the  matter 


40  JSisbop  Militants 

more  thoroughly.  There  must  be  some  mistake  about 
it.  Are  you  sure  there  is  no  leakage  from  the  roof  or  else- 
where that  would  affect  the  water  gauge  ? '  The  presi- 
dent sent  for  the  student  to  come  to  his  room.  'John, 
you  are  neither  a  duck  nor  a  goose,  so  don't  go  out  in 
the  rain  again  with  a  pitcher  of  water.  You  might  seri- 
ously interfere  with  the  calculations  of  the  United  States 
Weather  Bureau.'  John  afterwards  became  a  distin- 
guished bishop  in  the  Church,  but,  so  far  as  heard  from, 
was  never  known  either  to  deny,  or  affirm,  the  truth  of 
the  story. 

"As  students,  we  all  loved  the  president,  respected 
and  obeyed  him.  His  kind  heart  and  extraordinary 
tact  in  dealing  with  the  various  cases  of  discipline  that 
made  it  necessary  for  him  to  act — and  act  with  severity 
sometimes — won  our  approval.  No  delinquent  stood  in 
his  presence  who  did  not  feel  that  he  would  be  dealt 
with  justly  and  wisely.  Naughty  boys  know  when  they 
are  naughty  and  deserve  punishment;  and  so  long  as  the 
punishment  is  commensurate  with  the  offence,  and  is  ad- 
ministered in  love,  and  not  in  anger,  the  sentence  of 
punishment  is  acquiesced  in,  and  the  discipline  endured 
without  a  murmur. 

"  I  well  remember,  on  a  certain  night  as  I  was  going  to 
my  room  rather  late,  meeting  in  the  grove  a  student,  who 
afterwards  became  distinguished  as  an  eloquent  orator, 
a  powerful  politician,  and  eminent  governor.  He  was  in 
the  dumps,  in  rather  a  repentant  mood,  and  lashing  him- 
self with  stripes.  '  What  is  the  matter  ? '  I  asked.  '  What 
have  you  been  up  to  ? '  '  Oh,  nothing,  only  getting  a 
horse  into  one  of  the  recitation-rooms  on  the  ground 
floor.  The  prex  caught  me  at  it.  He  *s  always  around, 
night  and  day.  You  can't  get  rid  of  him.  Now,  to- 


TKUUUams  41 

morrow  he  '11  have  me  up,  and  talk  to  me  kindly  as  he 
always  does.  Oh,  how  I  dread  it.'  Then,  passing  sen- 
tence on  himself,  he  said:  'I  shall  be  rusticated  again, 
sent  away  to  some  stupid  country  place,  to  pass  a  month 
with  some  more  stupid  country  parson.'  All  of  which 
happened. 

"  It  was  the  custom  of  the  president  to  visit  the  stu- 
dents in  their  rooms  from  time  to  time;  and  there  was  no 
occasion  looked  forward  to  by  them  with  greater  delight. 
His  conversation  during  these  visits  was  interesting,  in- 
structive, and  amusing.  He  had  a  fund  of  stories  to 
illustrate  and  illuminate  his  talk;  and  one  could  not  but 
marvel  at  the  aptness  with  which  they  were  applied. 
As  a  story-teller  it  is  questionable  if  he  ever  had  his 
superior. 

"  The  simplest  events  of  his  life,  full  of  queer  inci- 
dents, would  be  told  in  language  so  forcible  and  oft- 
times  so  funny  as  to  make  them  gems  of  a  story,  and  set 
his  listeners  splitting  with  laughter.  But  there  were 
events  out  of  which  came  grave  stories  as  well  as  gay, 
which  not  infrequently  would  bring  tears  to  the  eyes. 
He  rarely  ever  repeated  a  story,  and  somehow  his  stories 
never  seemed  out  of  place,  so  perfectly  did  they  fit  in 
with  the  conversation  and  occasion. 

"  I  remember  once,  one  of  the  students,  more  bold 
than  the  others,  took  the  liberty  to  say:  'I  can't  believe 
such  a  thing  ever  happened.  I  think  you  must  have 
made  up  that  story  as  you  went  along  to  illustrate  what 
you  are  talking  about.'  The  president  laughed,  with  a 
mischievous  twinkle  in  his  eyes,  as  much  as  to  say, '  You 
have  found  me  out  in  part,  at  least.' 

"  There  was  a  time  of  great  excitement  in  the  college 
when  our  president  was  being  voted  for  as  Bishop  of  New 


42  JSisbop  Williams 

York,  but  of  great  rejoicing  in  a  few  days  after  when  he 
was  actually  elected  Bishop  of  Connecticut.  The  college 
buildings  were  illuminated,  he  was  welcomed  home  by 
the  whole  body  of  students  with  speeches  and  hurrahs 
and  a  band  of  music.  But  alas,  how  little  we  thought,  on 
that  night  of  joy,  that  we  were  making  merry  over  what 
was  to  become  to  us  a  cause  of  deep  sorrow.  To  be  made 
Bishop  of  the  Diocese  necessarily  took  him  away  from 
the  college  as  president,  and  eventually  from  Hartford 
as  a  resident.  We  missed  his  wise  counsel  and  kind  care, 
and  deeply  mourned  his  absence.  Some  of  the  students, 
however,  myself  among  the  number,  after  graduation 
followed  the  bishop  to  his  new  home  at  Middletown  and 
became  students  in  theology,  and  right  glad  were  we  to 
come  once  again  under  his  instruction.  We  were  older 
then,  more  mature  in  judgment,  and  could  fully  appreci- 
ate the  great  learning  and  ripe  scholarship  of  the  bishop. 
There  seemed  to  be  no  department  in  theology  of 
which  he  was  not  master.  Scriptural  exegesis,  ecclesias- 
tical history,  doctrinal  theology,  whether  of  the  ancient 
fathers,  or  modern  writers,  of  all  schools  and  shades  of 
opinion,  he  seemed  to  know  all  about.  With  the  con- 
troversy of  the  Roman  Church,  as  it  came  up  during  the 
Reformation  period,  as  well  as  the  claims  and  discus- 
sions of  the  dissenters  in  after  years,  he  was  quite 
familiar.  Hebrew,  Greek,  and  Latin  were  all  the  same 
to  him,  and  it  made  but  little  difference  whether  he  read 
the  Scriptures  in  one  or  the  other  tongue.  But  the 
bishop  did  not  confine  his  studies  to  theology.  He  was 
a  great  and  rapid  reader  of  almost  every  kind  of  litera- 
ture, even  novels.  He  had  a  wonderfully  retentive 
memory.  He  seemed  never  to  forget  anything  he  had 
ever  read:  and  years  afterwards  could  repeat  it  over 
almost  word  for  word. 


Bisbop  THUillfams  43 

"I  remember  on  one  occasion  being  in  his  study, 
when  a  celebrated  doctor  of  divinity,  a  great  connois- 
seur in  old  books,  came  in,  much  elated  that  he  had  pro- 
cured, after  years  of  waiting,  an  old  book  of  poetry.  He 
had  sent  to  London  for  it,  seeing  it  advertised  in  a  sale 
of  rare  books.  '  I  do  not  believe  there  is  another  copy 
of  this  book  in  the  United  States,'  he  said.  The  bishop 
was  silent  for  a  moment,  as  if  in  deep  thought,  then  re- 
plied, 'Is  that  the  poet  who  wrote  this?'  and  repeated 
several  verses,  and  then  again  repeated  from  another 
poem.  '  Why,  yes,'  said  the  doctor,  '  but  how  did  you 
know  this  poetry  ? '  '  Well,  I  have  not  opened  the  book 
for  twenty  years,  I  think,  but  there  is  a  copy  of  it  on  the 
top  shelf  of  my  bookcase.'  The  good  doctor  was  much 
amazed.  '  How  could  you  remember  the  poetry  after 
all  these  years,  and  why  did  I  never  find  out  you  had 
the  book  ? ' 

"  The  bishop's  mind  always  impressed  me  as  being  an 
orderly  arranged  storehouse,  where  every  package  of 
knowledge  was  labelled  and  could  be  taken  down  and 
used  at  will.  His  power  of  concentration  of  thought 
was  remarkable.  No  conversation  or  noise  seemed  to 
distract  or  disconcert  him  in  the  least,  whether  reading 
or  writing.  Many  times  when  several  persons  were  in  his 
study  talking,  and  the  bishop  was  sitting  at  his  desk  writ- 
ing, I  have  heard  them  say, '  We  had  better  go  elsewhere; 
we  shall  disturb  the  bishop.'  '  Oh,  no,  stay  and  go  on 
with  your  talk.  You  don't  bother  me  at  all.'  And  the 
result  of  his  writing  would  ofttimes  be  one  of  his  able 
sermons,  or  a  learned  article  for  some  newspaper  or 
magazine. 

"  During  the  trying  times  of  the  Civil  War,  the  bishop 
was  now  and  then  obliged  to  do  things  which  doubtless 
caused  him  much  pain,  and  went  greatly  against  his 


44  JSisbop  lUilliams 

kind  heart.  On  one  occasion  he  was  standing  on  the 
steps  of  his  residence  with  his  mother  and  friends 
viewing  a  company  of  soldiers  marching  off  to  the 
front.  A  young  man,  whose  father  had  been  a  dis- 
tinguished officer  under  the  United  States  Govern- 
ment, but  had  chosen  to  cast  in  his  lot  with  the  South, 
and  with  whom  the  bishop  had  been  on  intimate  and 
friendly  terms,  approached  and  stretched  out  his  hand 
for  a  cordial  greeting,  at  the  same  time  making  some 
sneering  remark  about  the  passing  soldiers.  The  bishop, 
putting  both  hands  behind  him,  drew  back  with  a  severe 
frown  on  his  face.  In  sharp,  severe  tones,  he  said:  '  I 
will  not  shake  hands  with  one  who  is  a  traitor  to  his 
country  and  who  speaks  contemptuously  of  those  going 
forth  to  defend  its  flag.'  The  young  man  turned  away 
rebuked,  much  abashed  and  doubtless  very  angry,  but 
it  was  '  a  time  to  speak,'  and  the  bishop  spoke  in  lan- 
guage not  to  be  misunderstood. 

"  One  of  the  pleasantest  and  most  delightful  remem- 
brances of  the  bishop  is  the  affection  he  had  for  his 
mother,  and  the  kind  and  considerate  care  he  always 
took  for  her  comfort  and  happiness.  In  her  declin- 
ing years,  when  age  and  sickness  confined  her  to  her 
room,  he  really  made  that  room  his  study,  moving 
there  his  writing-desk  and  some  of  his  choicest  books. 
It  was  a  long  sickness,  not  painful,  but  rather  a  gradual 
wearing  out  of  the  system  incident  to  old  age.  Many 
pleasant  evenings  do  I  recall  spent  in  that  room  of 
sickness;  and  never  can  one  who  was  present  forget 
the  day  on  which  that  noble  and  good  woman  died. 
It  was  the  day  of  the  annual  ordination  of  the  gradu- 
ating class  of  the  Berkeley  Divinity  School.  Of  course 
the  bishop  must  be  present  to  ordain,  but  his  mother 
was  dying  and  he  could  not  leave  her  bedside.  It 


JBisbop  Williams  45 

was  arranged  that  he  was  not  to  attend  the  service 
but  to  be  notified  when  the  time  came  for  the  act  of 
ordination.  Before  it  came,  however,  while  the  service, 
was  in  progress,  the  spirit  of  his  mother  departed,  and 
the  bishop,  almost  broken-hearted,  bowed  down  with 
grief,  hastened  to  the  church,  stepped  into  the  chancel, 
and  knelt  at  the  altar.  All  knew  the  great  sorrow  of  his 
life  was  upon  him  ;  and  every  heart  present  beat  in 
loving  sympathy,  a  sharer  of  his  anguish. 

"  It  was  my  great  privilege  to  accompany  the  bishop 
on  many  of  his  visitations  over  the  diocese.  The  most 
cordial  greeting  awaited  him  everywhere.  Men  and 
women,  as  well  as  children,  gathered  about  him  for  a 
kind  word  and  a  warm  pressure  of  his  generous  hand. 
Of  course  the  church  was  always  crowded  with  hearers. 
Every  parishioner  made  it  a  point  to  be  present  on  the 
bishop's  visit  to  the  parish.  His  sermons  during  the 
early  years  of  his  bishopric  were  usually  written  and  de- 
livered from  manuscripts,  but  in  later  years  were  always 
extemporaneous.  His  addresses  to  the  candidates  for 
confirmation  were  most  sympathetic  and  touching,  full 
of  wise  counsel  and  encouragement,  breathing  only  the 
spirit  of  Christian  love  and  charity,  and  making  the 
candidates  feel  that  they  were  welcome  to  their  Father's 
house  and  to  the  service  of  their  Divine  Lord  and 
Master. 

"On  one  occasion  in  a  country  parish,  at  an  early 
evening  service,  I  remember  the  lights  suddenly  went 
out  soon  after  the  bishop  commenced  his  discourse.  It 
was  a  written  sermon,  but  with  no  hesitation  or  apparent 
embarrassment  the  bishop  went  on,  and  in  the  dim  twi- 
light, growing  each  minute  darker,  delivered  one  of  the 
most  eloquent  sermons  I  ever  heard  him  preach.  The 


46  JSisbop  lUiIliams 

senior  warden  of  the  parish,  a  noble  old  sea  captain,  a 
devout  Churchman,  and  a  godly  man,  grandfather,  I  be- 
lieve, to  one  of  our  present  distinguished  bishops,  sat 
near  the  front  row  of  seats.  He  became  so  enraptured 
and  enthusiastic  over  the  bishop's  eloquence  that  he 
would  every  little  while  forget  himself,  and  nudging 
his  good  wife,  who  sat  by  his  side,  would  exclaim  in 
tones  so  loud  as  to  be  distinctly  heard  in  the  chancel, 
'Good!  Good!' 

"  I  said  to  the  bishop  after  the  service:  '  It  was  so  dark 
you  could  not  possibly  see  to  read;  how  could  you  re- 
member your  sermon  to  deliver  it  so  readily  ? '  '  Why, 
bless  you,  I  did  not  deliver  the  written  sermon  at  all.  I 
could  not  see  a  word.  I  gradually  drifted  into  what 
I  said,  but  I  hope  it  was  all  right.'  '  Never  was  there  a 
better  sermon,'  I  said.  This  shows  how  quick  and  ready 
the  bishop  was  to  overcome  difficulties,  and  master  the 
situation.  He  never  seemed  at  a  loss  what  to  do,  and 
he  always  seemed  to  do  just  the  right  thing.  He 
was  '  apt  and  meet '  in  a  most  extraordinary  sense  of 
those  words. 

"  It  would  be  a  very  incomplete  account  of  the  bishop 
if  I  should  leave  unmentioned  his  bodily  presence. 
While  it  might  be  said  of  him  as  was  said  of  St.  Paul, 
'  his  letters  are  weighty  and  powerful,'  it  could  not 
be  said  '  his  bodily  presence  is  weak  and  his  speech 
contemptible.'  The  bishop  was  what  would  be  called  a 
handsome  man.  Manly  and  noble  in  every  feature,  tall 
and  graceful  in  every  movement,  it  always  seemed  to 
me  the  description  of  Saul  would  well  apply  to  him: 
'  a  choice  young  man,  and  there  was  not  among  the 
children  of  Israel  a  goodlier  person  than  he.  When  he 
stood  among  the  people  he  was  higher  than  any  of  the 


Bisbop  Williams  47 

people  from  his  shoulders  and  upward.'  The  standard 
portrait  of  the  bishop,  by  Church,  gives  a  correct  im- 
pression of  his  personal  presence,  and  the  likeness  is 
perfect.  I  always  remember  what  one  of  my  vestrymen 
said  to  me  after  a  visitation  of  the  bishop  to  the  parish: 
'  He  reminds  me  of  a  king;  his  presence  is  royal,  and  he 
delivers  his  sermons  as  one  speaking  with  authority.' 
Of  course  there  is  much  more  that  might  be  said  of  the 
bishop  and  much  better  said.  My  memory  is  full  of  in- 
teresting incidents.  I  have  selected  such  matter,  how- 
ever, as  I  conclude  others  will  consider  too  trivial  to 
mention,  and  which  I  fear,  now  it  is  down  in  black  and 
white,  and  looked  at  with  cold  and  critical  eyes,  may  be- 
little the  great  man's  noble  character,  rather  than  give  it 
its  true  expression.  But  is  it  not,  after  all,  the  small 
and  apparently  unimportant  things  of  life,  the  every-day 
occasions,  and  the  manner  of  dealing  with  them,  that 
make  a  man's  character  great  and  good  ?  It  is  easy 
enough  to  be  magnanimous  on  exceptional  occasions 
when  the  eyes  of  the  world  are  upon  you,  but  it  is  not 
always  easy  to  '  deal  justly  and  love  mercy  '  and  act 
wisely  in  the  small  and  ofttimes  annoying  events  of  the 
passing  hour.  Truly  he  is  more  than  an  ordinary  man 
who  is  great  to  his  valet,  and  to  those  nearest  him;  but 
I  think  one  can  say  without  question  that  Bishop 
Williams  was  a  greater  and  better  man  to  those  closest 
to  him  than  he  was  to  those  who  saw  and  knew  him  only 
in  his  public  and  official  capacity. 

"  Before  closing,  let  me  say  what  was  once  said  to  me 
of  the  bishop,  by  one  who  knew  him  well,  but  who  was 
not  of  the  same  faith — by  one  too  who  was  fitted  as  few 
others  to  judge  correctly  of  his  learning,  and  literary 
ability,  and  of  his  oratorical  powers. 


48  Bisbop  mtlliams 

"  The  Rev.  Dr.  John  Lord,  famous  as  a  lecturer  and 
powerful  as  a  delineator  of  character,  said:  '  Had  the 
bishop  become  a  lawyer  instead  of  a  clergyman,  he 
would  have  been  one  of  the  ablest  lawyers  and  judges 
the  country  has  ever  seen;  logical  and  convincing  in 
argument,  just,  and  discerning  truth  from  error  in  his 
conclusions.' " 

To  these  interesting  reminiscences  of  college 
life,  I  may  fitly  add  those  which  follow,  from 
the  present  Bishop  of  California,  the  Right 
Reverend  William  F.  Nichols,  D.D.  Bishop 
Nichols,  like  Dr.  Hitchings,  enjoyed  in  a  rare 
degree  the  confidence  of  Bishop  Williams ; 
and  the  relations  of  the  two  men  grew  increas- 
ingly intimate,  until,  on  different  shores  of  the 
Western  Hemisphere,  they  came  to  bear  the 
same  episcopal  yoke.  In  this  point  of  view 
there  is  a  subtone  of  pathos  in  the  recollec- 
tions, from  the  pen  of  Bishop  Nichols,  which 
follow : 

"  Bishop  Williams's  boyhood  was  spent  at  historic  old 
Deerfield,  in  Massachusetts;  and  sometimes,  when  in  a 
reminiscent  mood,  he  would  absorb  his  listeners  in  his 
early  memories  of  home  and  of  that  country  and  com- 
munity. A  charm  of  the  experiences  that  he  recalled 
was  that  they  were  illustrations  of  a  type  of  early  New 
England  family  and  town  life  that  has  now  been  almost 
entirely  changed.  Evenings  there  were  around  the 
hearth-stone,  the  family  thrown  upon  its  own  resources 
for  passing  the  long  winters,  when  tales  were  told  of  the 


JSisbop  Williams  49 

days  of  the  Indian  savagery,  and  traditions  of  stirring 
scenes  at  Deerfield  itself  were  handed  down  at  the 
chimney-side.  These  made  a  great  impression  upon 
the  boy  John  Williams,  kinsmen  of  his  family  having 
suffered,  among  them  the  Rev.  John  Williams,  who  was 
carried  away  into  Canada.  This  may  in  part  account 
for  the  bishop's  life-long  fondness  for  Walter  Scott's 
tales,  which  he  heard  as  they  came  out  and  were  read 
in  that  same  family  circle.  It  was  the  bishop's  wont 
often  to  turn  from  the  cares  of  his  official  station,  in 
those  evenings  in  his  Middletown  home,  to  his  Scott's 
novels;  and  it  was  a  happy  choice  when,  Bishop  Wil- 
liams having  provided  that,  after  his  death,  his  close 
friend,  Bishop  Doane,  of  Albany,  should  select  any 
souvenir  he  wished  from  the  Middletown  house,  that 
well-used  set  passed  to  one  who  could  appreciate  their 
associations  so  truly.  And  Whittier's  Snow-bound 
ever  seemed  especially  to  appeal  to  Bishop  Williams's 
memories,  as 

'  Shut  in  from  all  the  world  without 
We  sat  the  clean-winged  hearth  about.' 

When  the  first  snow-storm  of  a  winter  came,  he  liked 
to  read  aloud  that  poem,  or  quote  from  it,  as  he  looked 
out  upon  the  falling  flakes,  the  lines: 

'  As  zigzag  wavering  to  and  fro 
Crossed  and  recrossed  the  winged  snow, ' 

noting  with  almost  boyish  glee — '  See  how  true  that  is, — 
the  flakes  never  seem  to  alight  anywhere! '  One  memory 
impressed  upon  him,  as  he  used  to  say,  by  its  conse- 
quences to  him  from  a  paternal  source,  as  well  as  by 

4 


so  Bisbop  Williams 

the  experience  itself,  carries  us  into  the  meeting-house 
atmosphere  of  the  day — for  his  boyhood  was  not  spent 
in  the  Church  of  his  after  choice.  Many  a  long  Sunday 
hour  he  spent  in  one  of  the  old-time  square  pews,  sit- 
ting through  the  old-time  discourse,  before  which  it  is 
to  be  feared  sometimes  the  hour  glass  had  about  the 
only  signs  of  real  'following.'  It  so  happened  that 
directly  in  front  of  the  boy  John  Williams  sat  a  worthy 
magnate  of  that  congregation,  whose  queue  so  adjusted 
itself  to  that  gentleman's  habitual  slumbers  in  sermon 
time  that,  as  his  head  slipped  down  on  the  back  of  the 
pew,  the  queue  took  an  angle  upward  and  projected 
over  into  the  pew  of  the  Williams  family  with  a  sort  of 
weekly  challenge  to  the  boy,  not  so  absorbed  in  the 
current  sermon  as  to  be  oblivious  of  the  fact.  Sunday 
after  Sunday  the  temptation  came,  and  was  resisted; 
but  it  finally  became  too  much  for  the  boy  nature;  and 
in  a  moment  when,  both  in  his  own  and  the  adjoining 
pew,  somnolence  seemed  to  reign,  the  challenge  was 
met;  the  queue  was  firmly  clutched  and  tweaked,  with 
an  instantaneous  effect  upon  several  staid  family  pews 
in  that  immediate  vicinity;  and  the  boy  never  forgot  it! 

"  Like  the  queue  itself,  such  experiences  are  now  of 
the  long  past;  and  the  very  image  of  that  family  life 
under  the  conditions  of  the  hearth-stone,  and  with  the 
survivals  of  the  older  New  England,  carries  one  back  to 
some  of  the  best  stock,  as  it  does  to  some  of  the 
most  wholesome  and  interesting  traits,  in  our  American 
origins. 

"  And  to  that  striking  filial  trait  of  Bishop  Williams 
which  one  recalls  in  his  tender  care  for  his  aged  mother, 
so  stately  and  queenlike,  as  she  made  her  home  with 
him  until  her  death  in  1872, — not  to  speak  of  love  of 
home  amid  all  the  home-leavings  of  his  busy  almost 


Bisbop  TKHillfams  51 

half-century  bishop's  life,  nor  of  his  allegiance  to  the 
best  of  old  New  England  traditions  and  ways, — how  he 
enjoyed  such  a  book  as  Mrs.  Stowe's  Old  Town  Stories, 
with  its  Parson  Lothrop  and  Sam  Lawson!  He  would 
never  have  any  new-fangled  electricity  about  him  if 
he  could  help  it, — how  much  that  Deerfield  boyhood 
explains  it  all.  And,  like  Bishop  Huntington,  there  was 
never  any  country  to  him  quite  equal  to  the  New  Eng- 
land hills  and  vales. 

"  His  college  days,  first  at  Harvard,  then  at  Trinity, 
won  for  him  the  high  respect  of  his  contemporaries,  as, 
for  example,  in  the  tribute  paid  him  some  years  since  in 
a  book  of  voluble  reminiscences  written  by  one  of  his 
Trinity  classmates,  Robert  Tomes.  The  late  Roman 
Catholic  Archbishop  of  Baltimore,  James  Roosevelt 
Bayley,  was  a  classmate  and  roommate  of  Bishop  Wil- 
liams at  Trinity.  The  well-known  Josiah  Quincy  was 
President  of  Harvard  while  John  Williams  was  an  un- 
dergraduate there;  and  the  bishop  had  some  memories 
of  his  experiences  there,  and  anecdotes  of  President 
Quincy,  which  showed  how  the  gentle  touch  of  the 
higher  human  in  the  sedate  president  appealed  to  the 
like  characteristic  of  the  undergraduate.  In  Dr.  Wil- 
liams's  own  presidency  of  Trinity  this  same  quality  was 
reproduced,  as  on  one  occasion  when  he  had  called 
before  him  an  irrepressible  student  to  reprimand  him. 
The  young  man  gave  a  mischievous  turn  to  his  explana- 
tion, which  so  touched  the  keen  sense  of  the  ludicrous 
of  the  president  that,  in  sheer  protection  of  his  gravity, 
he  was  obliged  to  cover  his  explosion  of  laughter  by  an 
instant  and  most  severe,  '  Leave  the  room,  sir,  this  min- 
ute! '  Is  there  any  wonder  that  he  always  won  the  love 
of  his  students  ? 

"  And  his  episcopate  was  itself  so  full  of  things  to  be 


52  JSisbop  Militants 

remembered  that  the  earlier  data  of  his  college  days  have 
been  in  a  background  which  has  receded  with  the  living 
memories  of  his  then  contemporaries,  who  have  almost, 
if  not  quite,  passed  from  earth.  Indeed,  so  varied  and 
so  strongly  impressed  are  the  reminiscences  of  him  all 
over  the  Church,  that  his  episcopate  has  had  the  rare 
distinction,  like  that  of  Bishop  Samuel  Wilberforce,  of 
becoming  a  sort  of  residuary  legatee  of  all  episcopal 
experiences  and  stories  that  are  unidentified  with  any 
other  name,  whether  Bishop  Williams  had  anything  to 
do  with  them  or  not.  But  any  one  who  ever  knew  him 
is  well  aware  that  in  well-authenticated  'sayings,  and 
stories,  and  experiences,  his  episcopate  was  so  rich  and 
delightful,  and  altogether  notable,  that  any  one  who  at- 
tempts to  recall  them  finds  it  hopeless  to  do  any  justice 
to  them  in  any  off-hand  way,  and  has  a  new  sense  of  the 
greater  pity  it  is  that  he  could  not  himself  have  gathered 
them  up  in  some  autobiographical  way  or  that  some 
competent  hand  could  not  have  systematically  compiled 
his  memoirs.  Such  sayings  as  '  The  Puritans  first  fell  on 
their  own  knees,  then  on  the  aborigines,'  or  his  quiet  re- 
buke at  a  dinner  when  some  one  was  pressing  him 
rather  too  inquisitively  about  the  affairs  of  one  of  his 
Clergy  with  some  such  question  as:  '  Has  the  Rev.  Mr. 

said  anything  to  you  about ? '    '  Nothing  to  speak 

of,  sir,'  will  long  be  quoted  from  his  lips.  And  what- 
ever any  one  may  find  coming  to  his  mind,  first,  out  of 
a  multitude  of  memories,  it  will  be  inevitable  that  some 
other  memory  of  him  that  some  one  else  could  tell  ought 
not  to  be  overlooked  in  any  fair  recollection  of  the  inex- 
haustible material  that  Bishop  Williams  has  left.  But 
even  if  they  chiefly  betray  the  slightness  of  the  sketch, 
two  or  three  memoranda  may  be  added,  taken  somewhat 
at  random. 


Bisbop  Militants  53 

"  On  one  of  his  visitations,  the  bishop  found  himself, 
in  the  time  between  breakfast  and  the  Sunday  morning 
service,  alone  with  the  rector's  young  hopeful  in  the 
study.  Chummy  relations  were  at  once  established,  and 
the  little  four-year-old  said:  '  Oh,  Bishop,  would  n't  you 
like  to  have  me  show  you  my  picture-book  ? '  'Of  course 
I  would,'  said  the  bishop.  Thereupon  the  book  was 
brought  out  and  looked  over  in  detail  with  full  zest  by 
both  bishop  and  child.  When  the  sitting  was  about 
to  adjourn  the  little  fellow  intensely  delighted  the  bishop 
by  remarking:  '  Now,  Bishop,  don't  tell  papa  about  this, 
'cause  he  won't  let  me  look  at  this  book  on  Sunday  ! ' 

"All  students  of  the  Berkeley  Divinity  School  of  a 
generation  ago  will  remember  '  Tim,'  the  faithful  janitor, 
— so  faithful  that,  when  told  to  do  anything,  he  showed  a 
charming  indifference  to  any  after  circumstances  which 
might  be  supposed  to  modify  directions, — any  '  law  of 
the  conditioned,'  for  Tim  was  no  metaphysician.  Now 
it  so  happened,  one  morning,  when  the  bishop  was  at- 
tending the  chapel  services  that  his  good  housekeeper, 
thinking  he  was  in  his  library,  asked  Tim  to  get  from 
him  certain  keys  she  wished  to  use.  Tim  obediently 
started  out.  Going  to  the  library,  and  not  finding  the 
bishop  there,  he  soon  learned  of  the  chapel  service,  and 
proceeded  forthwith  to  the  principal  chapel  door,  which 
is  on  the  'Quad'  side.  Just  as  Tim  opened  the  door, 
the  epistoler  had  announced,  'Here  endeth  the  epistle.' 
The  bishop  was  the  gospeller,  but  before  he  could  make 
the  customary  announcement,  in  that  Divinity  School 
chapel  of  punctilious  rubrical  propriety,  was  heard  from 
the  side  door,  in  riotous,  if  unconscious  innovation  by 
our  good  Roman  brother  Tim,  '  If  you  please,  sir,  Miss 

T wants  the  keys.'  'Very  well,  you  go  into  the 

house  and  get  them.  The is  written  in  the ' 


54  JSfsbop  VClilliams 

came  back  from  the  bishop  in  his  place  with  all  unruffled 
rubrical  order  and  readiness,  and  with  that  dignity  that 
ever  characterised  Bishop  Williams  in  service  and  out. 

"One  of  the  bishop's  private  secretaries  once  called 
his  attention  to  a  facetious  statement  in  a  newspaper  to 
the  effect  that  they  were  proposing  to  put  a  tax  on  bache- 
lors,— the  bishop  having  never  married.  '  Read  it,'  said 
the  bishop.  The  secretary  then  read  it  in  full,  to  the 
effect  that  upon  young  bachelors  the  tax  was  to  be  light, 
but  as  years  increased  and  probabilities  of  change  dimin- 
ished the  tax  was  to  be  made  more  and  more  weighty, 
until  to  those  upwards  of  seventy — as  the  bishop  then 
was — it  was  to  amount  to  some  hundreds  of  dollars  an- 
nually. The  secretary  read  the  latter  part  with  some- 
thing of  a  gusto.  When  he  had  finished,  the  bishop 

said,  calling  the  secretary  by  name,  '  P ,  it  comes 

high,  but  it 's  worth  it.' 

"  Such  kindly  flashes  of  humour,  in  sometimes  a  mock 
heroic  tone,  were  only  the  sparks  thrown  off  from  the 
jtrong  voltage  'of  his  great  life  current.  It  was  a  cur- 
rent which  carried  men  along  with  him.  Its  momentum 
lasts  still  in  many  a  ministry,  and  now  with  statistical  ac- 
curacy it  could  be  said  in  many  an  episcopate.  That 
strong,  quiet  dynamic  energy  of  his  character  and  work 
has  been  interpreted  into  action  in  the  Church,  as  has 
happened  in  the  case  of  our  modern  leaders.  But  it 
would  not  be  easy  to  describe  it  even  in  a  full  memoir. 
And  here  we  only  catch  some  of  the  scintillations  of  its 
presence,  as  in  the  night  the  wheels  of  a  modern  motor 
now  and  then  sparkle  and  crackle  with  the  subtle  power 
that  is  all  the  while  mightily  turning  them  onward." 

When  Bishop  Williams  died,  there  appeared 
a  number  of  tributes  to  his  memory,  and  among 


Bisbop  Williams  55 

them  the  lines  with  which  this  paper  concludes. 
The  writer,  the  late  Rev.  Robert  Clarkson 
Tongue,  was  then — or  had  lately  been — a 
pupil  of  Bishop  Williams'  in  the  Berkeley 
Divinity  School,  and  was  at  the  time  of  his 
death  a  rector  in  the  Diocese  of  Connecticut. 
They  are  singularly  happy  in  describing  a 
species  of  influence  in  exerting  which  the 
fourth  Bishop  of  Connecticut  was  undoubtedly 
pre-eminent. 

"  Saint  of  Northurabria!  Well  may  England  prize 
Her  priestly  scholar  and  revere  his  name; 
The  long  millennium  doth  not  dim  the  eyes 
Of  those  whose  lamps  are  kindled  at  his  flame. 
First  of  a  dynasty  that  has  no  end, 
This  is  the  teacher's  heritage,  to  mark 
The  lives  of  men  unborn,  and  so  to  send 
His  ageless  purpose  gleaming  down  the  dark. 

"  New  England  Basda,  thou  of  yesterday, 
The  years  are  all  before  thee.     Year  on  year 
Shall  speed  thy  purpose  on  its  widening  way, 
When  we  are  dust  who  looked  upon  thy  bier. 
We  bear  thine  impress,  we  are  of  thy  line, 
And  we  shall  be  forgot;  the  torch  we  hold 
Was  of  thy  lighting,  that  more  clear  shall  shine 
After  the  long  millennium  is  told." 


Bishop  J6astburn 


57 


IV 

Btebop  iBaetburn 

THE    RIGHT    REVEREND    DR.    MANTON    EASTBURN, 
BISHOP    OF    MASSACHUSETTS 

WHEN  as  preacher  at  the  consecration 
of  Bishop  Phillips  Brooks  I  referred  to 
the  loneliness  of  a  bishop's  life,  my  remark 
awakened  a  strain  of  criticism  which  was 
curiously  and  pathetically  denunciatory.  Of 
course  it  came  from  people  who  knew  no- 
thing of  what  they  were  denouncing ;  and  its 
acidity  was  the  just  measure  of  its  ignorance. 
But  those  who  indulged  in  such  criticism, 
while  they  did  not  seek  to  understand  a  mat- 
ter with  which  they  were  wholly  unfamiliar, 
might  easily,  had  they  seen  fit,  have  insisted 
upon  a  distinction  between  different  kinds  of 
loneliness,  which  ought  always  to  be  recog- 
nised. Any  man  whose  functions  are,  in  what- 
ever measure,  judicial,  may  wisely  cultivate  a 
good  deal  of  reserve  in  their  exercise.  If,  as 
has  very  often  happened,  he  puts  himself  in 

5} 


60  Sisbop  Bastburn 

the  hands  of  ecclesiastical  counsellors  who  are 
also  ecclesiastical  intimates,  his  judgments  will 
be  suspected,  and  often  deservedly,  of  having 
a  partisan  note  which  greatly  discounts  their 
value.  And  if,  whatever  his  judgments,  he 
has  only  one  set  of  intimates,  two  or  three 
of  whom  may  easily  be  as  able  as,  or  abler 
than,  he,  it  will  be  strange  if  his  official  atti- 
tude towards  those  from  whom  he  differs  is 
not  sometimes  partial  and  ungenerous.  For 
these  reasons,  therefore,  the  episcopate  may 
wisely  bring  with  it  the  surrender  of  many  in- 
timacies ;  and  the  denial  of  opportunities 
which  intellectual  intimacy  involves  must 
needs  be,  often,  a  costly  and  painful  de- 
privation. 

But  the  moment  that  this  is  said,  there  is 
something  on  the  other  side  which  needs  to  be 
said,  and  of  which  the  subject  of  this  sketch 
was  a  tragic  illustration.  It  is  possible  to  be 
lonely  from  a  sense  of  duty  ;  but,  alas  !  it  is  no 
less  possible  to  be  isolated  from  choice  ;  and 
this  may  come  to  pass  almost,  if  not  quite, 
unconsciously. 

Bishop  Manton  Eastburn  was  born  in  Leeds, 
England,  A.D.  1801,  and  came  to  the  United 
States  when  about  twelve  years  old.  He  en- 
tered Columbia  College  during  his  thirteenth 


'hf-  h&mis  of  ecclesiastical  crmf*seUors  who  are 
«*iso  ecclesiastical  intimates,  his  judgments  will 
be  suspected,  and  often  deservedly,  of  having 
£  partisan  note  which  greatly  discounts  their 
value.  And  if,  whatever  his  judgments,  he 
has  only  one  set  of  intimates,  two  or  three 
of  whom  may  easily  be  as  able  as,  or  abler 
than,  he,  it  will  Ix  strange  if  his  official  atti- 
tude towards  those  from  whom  he  differs  is 
not  sometimes  psrtuii  and  ungenerous.  For 
thes<*  reasons,  thert -foi  episcopate  may 

'  The  Right  Reverend- 
s-Doctor Manton  Eastburnf,'«'r 
Bishop  of  Massachusetts. 

-From  a  photograph. 

privation. 

But  the  moment  that  this  inert:  is 

something  on  the  other  >kJe  v  j»jd\  needs  to  be 
said,  and  of  which  the  subject  of  this  sketch 
was  a  tragic  illustration.  It  is  possible  to  be 
lonely  from  a  sense  of  duty  ;  but,  alas  !  it  is  no 
less  possible  to  !>e  isolated  from  choice  ;  and 
this  may  com':  to  pa*s  almost,  if  nor  'juite, 
unconsciously 

Bishop  Manton  T.-.T^urn  «*a*:  .n  Leeds, 

England,  A.I),  i  s<  ,  nt  r.j  the  United 

States  when  about  m-rivc  years  old.  He  en- 
tered Columbia  CoJl»"vr  durincr  his  thirteenth 


HBfsbop  Eastburn  61 

year,  and  graduated  at  the  age  of  sixteen.  A 
few  years  later  he  became  a  theological  stu- 
dent, was  ordained  deacon  and  priest  by  Bishop 
Hobart,  and,  after  a  brief  service  as  an  assist- 
ant minister  in  Christ  Church,  New  York,  be- 
came, in  1827,  the  first  rector  of  the  Church 
of  the  Ascension,  New  York,  where  he  minis- 
tered until,  in  1842,  he  was  elected  Assistant 
Bishop  of  Massachusetts.  Bishop  Griswold, 
his  senior,  died  within  some  six  weeks  of 
Bishop  Eastburn's  consecration  ;  and,  in  1843, 
Bishop  Eastburn  was  left  in  exclusive  charge 
of  the  Diocese  of  Massachusetts. 

It  illustrates  the  feebleness  of  the  Church  in 
New  England  at  that  time  that  the  Church 
in  Massachusetts  could  not  support  a  bishop 
who  was  not  also  a  rector,  and  that  Bishop 
Eastburn  had  so  little  to  do  of  an  episcopal 
nature  that  his  visitations  could  all  be  com- 
pleted during  a  few  weeks'  absence  from  his 
parish  in  the  spring  and  autumn.  For  the 
rest  of  the  year  he  could  devote  himself,  unre- 
servedly, as  he  did,  to  the  ordinary  duties  of 
the  rectorship  of  Trinity  Church. 

That  parish  then  enjoyed  the  advantage  of 
two  endowments  ;  one  for  the  maintenance  of 
a  course  of  lectures  instituted  by  means  of  what 
was  known  as  the  Price  Fund,  and  the  other, 


62  JSisbop  Bastburn 

the  Greene  Foundation,  a  bequest  by  a  par- 
ishioner of  that  name  for  the  purpose  of  pro- 
viding the  parish  with  an  assistant  minister. 
The  assistant  minister  had  charge  of  the 
parish  during  the  bishop's  absence,  and  at 
other  times  preached  once  on  Sunday,  and 
divided  with  the  bishop  the  other  duties  of  the 
parish.  To  this  office  I  was  called  about  the 
time  that  I  became  secretary  of  the  House  of 
Bishops,  and  it  brought  me  into  a  relationship 
with  Bishop  Eastburn  which  was  equally  inter- 
esting and  unusual. 

Unusual,  I  say,  for  I  was  so  much  the 
bishop's  junior  that,  from  the  outset,  his  inter- 
course with  me  was  alike  affectionate  and  un- 
reserved. The  bishop  was  what  might  now 
be  called  an  old-fashioned  low-Churchman, 
and  his  preaching  had  that  note  of  somewhat 
ponderous  circumlocution  from  which,  as  I 
shall  endeavour  to  show  in  speaking  of  Bishop 
Thomas  M.  Clark,  some  of  his  peers  and  con- 
temporaries had  already  broken  away.  Bishop 
Phillips  Brooks,  who,  as  a  lad,  had  sat  under 
Bishop  Eastburn's  preaching,  used  to  tell  a 
story  (I  do  not  vouch  for  it)  of  having  heard 
Bishop  Eastburn,  in  a  discourse  on  the  rich 
man  and  Lazarus,  refer  to  the  prayer  of  the 
rich  man,  when  in  torment,  that  Lazarus 


Bisbop  Bastburn  63 

might  dip  the  tip  of  his  finger  in  water  and 
cool  the  rich  man's  tongue  ;  and  affirmed  that 
the  bishop,  after  quoting  the  verse  in  which 
these  words  occur,  added,  sententiously,  "  To 
this  wholly  inadmissible  request  the  patriarch 
returned  a  negative  reply." 

But  though  this  was  characteristic  of  the 
bishop's  style  of  pulpit  utterance,  his  habit  of 
conversation,  as  I  remember  it,  was  singularly 
informal  and  unreserved.  Indeed,  my  own 
acquaintance  with  him  began  in  a  burst  of  can- 
dour on  his  part  which,  whether  in  directness 
or  frankness,  could  not  easily  be  matched.  I 
had  just  been  elected  to  the  "  Greene  Founda- 
tion," and,  at  his  own  table,  was  dining  with 
him  for  the  first  time.  After  dinner  the  bishop 
fidgeted  in  his  chair,  in  a  fashion  that  be- 
trayed, plainly  enough,  his  discomfort ;  and, 
springing  at  last  from  his  seat,  went  to  the 
sideboard  and  seized  a  box  of  cigars.  Turn- 
ing towards  me  as  he  did  so,  and  remember- 
ing, I  suppose,  that  I  was  the  son  of  one  who, 
as  a  college  professor,  had  been  widely  known 
for  his  hostility  to  tobacco,  he  exclaimed,  with 
a  lugubrious  expression  which  I  can  never  for- 
get, "  Dr.  Potter,  I  presume  that  you  don't 
smoke  ?  " 

"  Whenever   I   can  get  a  chance,  I   do,"  I 


64  JSisbop  Bastburn 

answered  promptly.  Whereupon,  his  whole 
face  broadening  into  a  smile  of  delighted  sur- 
prise, he  exclaimed,  "  Thank  God !  I  was 
afraid  that  you  had  inherited  the  detestable 
prejudices  of  your  father  ! " 

Nothing  could  have  been  more  entirely 
characteristic  of  Bishop  Eastburn.  Any  man 
who  differed  from  him,  upon  any  conceivable 
subject,  in  theology  or  life,  social,  literary,  or 
philosophical,  was,  from  his  point  of  view,  the 
victim  of  a  "  detestable  prejudice."  He  had 
made  up  the  parce?  of  his  opinions, — in  what 
lights  and  under  what  influences  I  do  not 
know, — had  neatly  tied  them  up  with  the  red 
tape  of  a  cherished  tradition,  and  had  de- 
posited the  package  on  the  top  shelf  of  his 
mental  storehouse,  not  to  be  taken  down  or 
disturbed  under  any  conceivable  conditions. 
He  was  a  scholar  ;  and  he  had  a  sincere  love 
of  letters,  which  made  him  one  of  the  best 
students  of  the  classics  whom  I  ever  knew. 
Indeed,  it  was  my  commonest  experience, 
whenever  I  entered  his  library,  to  find  him 
with  a  volume  of  some  Greek  or  Latin  poet  in 
his  hand.  But  living,  as  he  did,  through  an 
era  which  witnessed  some  of  the  most  tre- 
mendous readjustments  of  Christian  faith  and 
dogma,  he  never,  so  far  as  I  could  learn,  con- 


JSfsbop  Bastburn  65 

sented  to  read  a  line  of  the  authors  who  dis- 
cussed them,  or  to  talk  about  them  or  their 
work  with  any  one  who  had. 

It  was  this  mental  attitude — it  is  not  an  un- 
common one  among  theologians — that  created 
that  pathetic  isolation  to  which  I  have  re- 
ferred. It  is  unnecessary  that  I  should  re- 
mind my  readers  that  Bishop  Eastburn  was 
surrounded  by  an  intellectual  atmosphere,  culti- 
vated, acute,  and  supremely  interrogative. 
With  one  phase  of  this  he  was  socially  intimate  ; 
for,  when  I  lived  in  Boston,  he  belonged  to  a 
club  whose  meetings,  on  a  week  night,  I  have 
always  understood  that  he  attended  with  con- 
siderable regularity,  and  where  he  met  many 
men,  and  discussed  many  subjects — or  heard 
them  discussed — that  must  have  taken  his 
mind  far  afield.  But,  so  far  as  I  could  dis- 
cover, no  experience  of  this  kind  awakened  in 
him  any  curiosity,  nor  produced  in  him  any 
other  mental  process  than  to  cling  more  closely 
to  his  own  opinions. 

It  was  this  mental  characteristic,  or  habit, 
that  made  his  life  an  exceptionally  lonely  one, 
and  that  grew  upon  him  as  years  went  on. 
When  I  came  to  know  him,  he  was  a  sep- 
tuagenarian, and  his  points  of  view  were 
fixed  and  unchangeable.  That,  I  suppose,  is 


66  ISisbop  Eastburn 

characteristic  of  many  men  who  are  no  longer 
young ;  but  in  his  case  it  had  produced  a 
frigidity  of  attitude,  and  an  impatience  of  in- 
tellectual dissent,  which  left  him  pathetically 
isolated  among  the  best  minds  of  his  genera- 
tion. He  loved  a  horse,  and  rode  him  well ; 
but  no  one,  I  apprehend,  ever  saw  him  pass 
along  Beacon  Street  on  horseback,  on  his  way 
out  of  town,  without  being  sensible  of  a  cer- 
tain note  of  loneliness  in  that  solitary  figure, 
which  was  profoundly  touching. 

For,  underneath  the  somewhat  chilly  exte- 
rior, and  the  formal  and  reserved  manner,  there 
was  a  singularly  warm  and  tender  heart.  The 
friends  who  loved  him,  loved  him  for  qualities 
that  were  exceptionally  noble  and  lovable.  He 
was  absolutely  constant,  and  absolutely  fear- 
less ;  and  this  last  made  of  him  a  champion 
whose  instinct  of  loyalty  to  a  friend  was  at 
once  chivalric  and  imperious.  I  was  leaving 
his  study  one  morning  when  the  bell  rang; 
and  the  bishop,  stepping  to  a  window  that 
commanded  the  front  door,  said  :  "  Wait  a  mo- 
ment, Potter.  Here  comes  a  committee,  and 
I  should  like  to  have  you  present  while  I  re- 
ceive them."  The  committee  was  from  a  sub- 
urban parish  whose  rector  was  a  man  already 
known  by  his  pen,  of  eccentric  habits,  but  of 


JSisbop  jeastburn  67 

rare  gifts.  He  had  made  himself  obnoxious  in 
the  family  of  one  of  the  vestry  by  declining  to 
continue  in  it  as  a  "  table  boarder "  when  he 
found  the  table  impossible  ;  and  the  committee 
had  come,  at  the  instigation  of  the  lady  whose 
table  he  had  deserted,  to  denounce  him  as  an 
opium-eater. 

The  bishop  heard  the  charge  (which  I  may 
say  here  was  false)  with  a  pained  surprise, 
which  he  at  once  proceeded  to  express ;  and 
then,  after  a  moment's  pause,  he  said:  "  I  sup- 
pose, gentlemen,  you  wish  me  to  take  canoni- 
cal action  in  this  painful  business,  and  I  shall 
proceed  to  do  so.  But,  to  that  end,  it  is  neces- 
sary that  the  charge  should  be  presented  to 
me  in  writing,  and  that  you  should  subscribe 
your  names  to  it."  At  this  suggestion  the 
faces  of  the  committee  underwent  a  sudden 
transformation,  and  with  one  accord  they 
sprang  to  their  feet,  their  spokesman  exclaim- 
ing :  "  Oh,  no,  Bishop  !  We  could  n't  do  that ! 
We  don't  want  to  sign  anything.  We  merely 
wished  to  come  and  tell  you  what  you  have 
heard,  and  leave  the  matter  in  your  hands. 
But  we  could  n't  sign  any  paper." 

"  No,"  said  the  bishop,  while  his  whole  form 
dilated  with  the  indignation  which  was  seething 
within  him.  "  No  !  You  will  not  stand  behind 


68  JSisbop  JEastburn 

your  charge,  when  you  are  called  upon  to  do 
it ;  but,  though  you  know  that  a  clergyman's 
reputation  is  well-nigh  as  sensitive  as  a  woman's, 
you  will  do  all  that  you  can  to  destroy  it ;  and 
when  you  are  asked  to  subscribe  to  your  own 
accusation  you  will  refuse."  The  bishop  had 
risen  from  his  seat,  and  was  moving  towards 
his  study  door  as  he  continued  :  "  Do  you  know, 

gentlemen,  what  the  Rev.  Dr. would 

do  if  he  were  a  layman  ?  He  would  horsewhip 
you — and  so  would  I  !  Good  morning,  gentle- 
men ! "  And  the  bishop  swung  open  the  door 
and  bowed  them  out. 

One  more  scene  recurs  to  me,  which  was 
wholly  different  in  the  kindly  temper  that 
inspired  it,  and  yet  was  none  the  less  memor- 
able in  that  absolute  candour  which  distin- 
guished it.  It  was  at  the  bishop's  table,  on 
the  evening  of  the  consecration,  as  Bishop  of 
Central  New  York,  of  the  late  Dr.  Frederic 
Dan  Huntington.  On  Bishop  Eastburn's 
right  sat  Bishop  Clark  of  Rhode  Island, 
Bishop  Coxe  of  Western  New  York,  and 
Bishop  Randall  of  Colorado ;  and  on  his  left 
Bishop  Horatio  Potter  of  New  York,  Bishop 
Littlejohn  of  Long  Island,  and  Bishop  Hunt- 
ington of  Central  New  York.  As  secretary 
of  the  House  of  Bishops,  I  was  at  the  foot  of 


JBfsbop  Bastburn  69 

the  table,  and  was  the  only  presbyter  present. 
When  dinner  was  concluded,  the  bishop  rose 
in  his  place,  and,  holding  a  glass  of  wine  in 
his  hand,  said,  after  a  few  words  of  affection- 
ate reference  to  the  newly  consecrated  bishop, 
"  Brethren,  I  wish  to  propose  his  health " ; 
and  then,  after  an  instant's  pause,  "and  I  am 
the  only  man  at  this  table  who  has  a  right  to 
do  it,  for" —  running  his  eye  round  the  table 
until  it  had  included  in  its  sweep  every  bishop 
present — "  I  am  the  only  born  Churchman 
among  you  !  "  I  remember  well  the  startled 
pause  that  followed  ;  but  he  was  right.  Bishop 
Clark  had  been  -born  a  Congregationalist ; 
Bishop  Coxe  a  Presbyterian  ;  Bishop  Randall 
a  Baptist ;  Bishop  Horatio  Potter  a  Quaker ; 
Bishop  Littlejohn  a  Presbyterian  ;  and  Bishop 
Huntington  a  Unitarian.  But  no  one  among 
them  all,  whatever  the  stern  theological  in- 
tolerance of  the  host,  had  a  larger  heart  or 
a  more  enduring  affection  for  his  fellow-men. 
When  he  had  passed  away,  and  when,  in  ac- 
cordance with  its  rule,  the  House  of  Bishops 
had  concluded  the  simple  office  that  recog- 
nised his  departure,  one  of  the  least  demonstra- 
tive of  his  associates  walked  to  the  desk  where 
I  was  making  a  record  of  the  bishop's  death, 
and  putting  his  finger  upon  the  name  that  I 


70  JBisbop  Eastburn 

had  just  written  said,  '*  I  shall  miss  him  greatly." 
(They  had  not  a  theological  conviction  in  com- 
mon.) "  He  was  the  only  man  who  always 
called  me  'Horatio'  !" 


Bishop  Clark 


V 

Bisbop  Clark 

THE    RIGHT    REVEREND    DR.    THOMAS   MARCH 
CLARK,    BISHOP    OF    RHODE    ISLAND 

A  VERY  distinct  and  a  very  individual 
figure  in  the  House  of  Bishops  for  nearly 
fifty  years  was  that  of  the  second  Bishop  of 
Rhode  Island,  Dr.  Thomas  M.  Clark,  who  was 
in  many  respects  less  eminent  as  an  ecclesias- 
tic than  as  a  teacher,  a  thinker,  and  a  prophet. 
He  was  of  New  England  ancestry,  and  was 
nurtured  in  the  straitest  sect  of  its  Puritan 
traditions  and  its  Congregationalist  theology. 
He  outgrew  both  of  them,  but  he  never  forgot 
them  ;  and  the  dominion  which  they  exercised, 
until  the  close  of  an  unusually  long  life,  over 
his  imagination,  if  not  over  his  reason,  was  one 
of  the  most  pathetic  facts  in  his  history.  While 
a  student  at  Princeton  College,  he  came  under 
the  influences  that  made  of  him  a  Churchman  ; 
and  later,  when  a  rector  in  Hartford,  Conn.,  he 
found  himself  a  neighbour  of  one  of  the  most 

73 


74  JBisbop  Clarfc 

original  and  vigorous  minds  that  this  country 
has  produced — I  mean  that  of  Dr.  Horace 
Bushnell.  In  Dr.  Bushnell's  Life  there  are 
letters  from  Bishop  Clark  which  disclose  the 
influence  of  Dr.  Bushnell,  and  the  conditions 
under  which  it  came  to  be  exercised.  Events 
move  so  rapidly,  and  changes  during  the  last 
half  century  in  the  dogmatic  positions  of  many 
Christian  bodies  have  been  so  considerable, 
that  it  is  not  easy,  to-day,  to  realise  how  abso- 
lute was  the  empire  which  certain  theological 
traditions  and  usages  exercised  over  the  mind 
and  speech  of  Bishop  Clark  until  he  had  reached 
middle  life.  Of  usage,  I  say,  as  well  as  of  theo- 
logical opinions ;  for  in  one  particular  Bishop 
Clark  was  the  leader,  at  any  rate  in  his  own 
Communion,  of  a  departure  from  what  was 
counted  as  the  rhetorical  usage  of  the  pulpit, 
as  noteworthy  as  it  was  radical.  When  the 
Rev.  Thomas  M.  Clark  began  his  ministry  the 
usage  in  preaching  was  to  be  stately,  ponder- 
ous, and  somewhat  circumlocutory.  The  last 
thing  that  a  preacher  dreamed  of  doing  was  to 
call  a  spade  a  spade  ;  and  when  Bishop  Clark 
broke  with  the  accustomed  usage  it  was  the  in- 
troduction of  a  startling  novelty.  As  a  lad,  I 
was  wont  to  follow  him  about  with  a  dog-like 
devotion  when  he  came  to  Philadelphia,  where 


74  Bi?bop  Clarfc 

->a!  *nd  vigorous  mind*  that  this  country 

h^>  produced —  I    mean  that  of   Dr.    Horace 

Hiishnell.      In   Dr.   Bushmill's     '.iff  there  are 

letters  from   Bishop  ('lark   whuh  disclose  the 

influence  of  Dr.  Bu>hnolJ   and    the  conditions 

under  whicl          imc   to  b«-      ^Tcised.      Events 

move  so  rapidly,  and  changes  during  the  last 

half  cents:  v  in  the  dogmatic  positions  of  many 

Christ  ^lies  have   been  so  considerable, 

that  it  i  '-ASV.  to-day,  to  realise  how  abso- 

which  certain  theological 

The  Right  RevWettcF  tne  mmd 

Doctor  Thomas  March  ClSrftiac 

Bishop  of  Rhode  Island. 

From  a  photograph  by  Naegeli,  New  York. 

«\vn 

•  :    «  hat  was 

.  i*-».tj,jv  of  the  pulpit, 

?.-A^  radical.     When  the 

btrk  began  his  ministry  the 

usai/'  ;  ^^^  *'>  be  stately,  ponder- 

uus,  a:1  •. -»    '.  tt,  iirnlrn-uiory.      The  last 

thin^  that  Ifimed  of  doing  was  to 

call  a  spade  ;i  .p  •••  -md  when  Bishop  Clark 
broke  with  tlu  a«  :-tr.m»fi  asagt  it  was  th<  IP.- 
troduction  of  ;>  nov«"!t>  As  a  lad,  I 

\v«is  wont  to  follow  ii»h  a  ciog-like 

^»»on  when  ht:  earn-  ''"!:>hia,  where 


JSisbop  Glarft  75 

in  his  earlier  ministry  he  had  been  settled. 
He  was  once  preaching  in  St.  Stephen's 
Church,  Philadelphia,  from  the  story  of  Naa- 
man's  cleansing  and  conversion,  as  given  in 
2  Kings  v.,  and  his  text  was  :  "  In  this  thing 
the  Lord  pardon  thy  servant,  that  when  my 
master  goeth  into  the  house  of  Rimmon  to 
worship  there,  and  he  leaneth  on  my  hand, 
and  I  bow  myself  in  the  house  of  Rimmon  ; 
when  I  bow  down  myself  in  the  house  of  Rim- 
mon, the  Lord  pardon  thy  servant  in  this 
thing."  (V.  1 8.)  In  other  words,  Naaman  had 
been  cleansed  of  his  leprosy  by  Elisha,  and  had 
professed  his  faith  in  the  God  of  Israel.  But 
he  was  a  servant  of  the  King  of  Syria,  and  his 
master  was  a  pagan.  He  would  be  obliged, 
when  in  attendance  upon  the  king,  to  go  into 
a  pagan  temple,  and  he  asked,  in  advance,  to 
be  forgiven  if,  outwardly,  he  conformed  to  its 
usages. 

As  was  not  unnatural,  the  preacher  used  the 
incident  to  illustrate  the  unworthiness  of  a  half- 
hearted service  ;  and  waxing  warm  he  said — in 
that  pathetic  tenor  voice  of  his  which  no  one 
who  ever  heard  it  will  forget — "  I  am  not  un- 
mindful, my  dear  brethren,  that  Naaman  asked 
of  the  prophet  two  mules'  burden  of  earth 
wherewith  to  erect  an  altar  to  the  true  God  :  but 


76  JSisbop  Clarft 

I  have  mo  doubt,  that  if  we  could  have  followed 
him  to  that  far-off  land  to  which  he  returned, 
we  should  have  found  that  he  carted  the  earth 
into  the  back  yard  and  dumped  it  there,  and 
that  that  was  the  end  of  it." 

I  was  but  a  small  boy  that  afternoon,  but  I 
can  remember  as  though  it  had  happened  yes- 
terday the  shock  which  this  familiar  imagery 
gave  to  that  polished  congregation.  The 
"back  yard,"  and  the  "  dumping"  were  figures 
unfamiliar  to  pulpit  rhetoric  as  they  knew  it, 
but  they  "  sat  up,"  understanding  it,  and  did 
not  go  to  sleep  ! 

No  one  did  who  listened  to  Bishop  Clark. 
In  the  House  of  Bishops  he  was  not  a  fre- 
quent speaker,  but  when  he  rose  to  his  feet,  his 
brethren  paused  from  whatever  tasks  that  were 
engaging  them,  and  gave  to  him  their  undi- 
vided attention.  He  saw  large  questions  in  a 
large  light ;  and  upon  a  discussion  which  was 
running  in  somewhat  narrow  and  conven- 
tional ruts  he  would  sometimes  descend  with  a 
few  pungent  and  illuminative  sentences  which 
cleared  the  whole  air. 

Added  to  this  was  a  sense  of  humour  which, 
coupled  with  his  intimate  knowledge  of  Scrip- 
ture, was  simply  irresistible.  The  incident 
which  I  am  about  to  relate  has  often  been 


JSisbop  Clarfc  77 

imputed  to  one  who  preceded  him  in  the  office 
of  Presiding  Bishop,  but  inaccurately.  A  Pre- 
siding Bishop,  senior  to  both  of  them,  and 
whose  Christian  name  was  Benjamin,  was 
attempting,  on  one  occasion,  to  explain  his 
action  in  a  matter  of  ecclesiastical  discipline, 
which  had  been  widely  criticised.  As  he  pro- 
ceeded, it  became  plain  that  his  explanation 
was  likely  only  to  involve  the  whole  subject  in 
deeper  mystery ;  and  as  the  bishop  went  on, 
piling  one  obscure  or  contradictory  statement 
on  top  of  another,  until  the  whole  subject 
became  hopelessly  involved,  and  unintelligible, 
Bishop  Clark  passed  my  desk,  and  by  a  dex- 
terous backward  movement  of  his  hand  pro- 
jected a  small  roll  of  paper  across  the  page  on 
which  I  was  writing.  Unrolling  it  unsuspect- 
ingly I  read,  "  But  Benjamin's  mess  was  five 
times  so  much  as  any  of  theirs."1  The  situa- 
tion could  not  have  been  more  accurately 
described ! 

But  it  would  be  a  very  inaccurate  impression 
of  Bishop  Clark  to  suppose  that  levity  or 
frivolity  was  the  dominant  note  of  his  char- 
acter. The  old  proverb  which  describes  the 
fountains  of  laughter  and  tears  lying  very 
close  together  never  had  a  more  striking 

1  Gen.  xliii. ,  34. 


78  JSfsbop  Clarft 

illustration  than  in  the  mind  of  Bishop  Clark. 
On  the  one  hand,  there  was  his  Puritan  ances- 
try, with  its  theology  of  gloom  and  despair, — its 
familiar  axiom  being  that  one  was  not  fit  to 
be  saved  until  he  was  willing  to  be  damned  ; 
and  with  him  there  was  a  keen  sense  of  the 
comic,  a  delightful  sensitiveness  to  the  incon- 
gruous, which  made  of  his  companionship  an 
unceasing  entertainment.  One  morning  when 
I  was  a  New  York  rector  he  came  into  my 
study,  saying,  "  I  am  going  abroad  for  six 
months."  As  my  relations  with  the  bishop 
were  more  than  usually  confidential,  and  I 
knew  how  many  demands  were  made  upon  his 
purse,  I  was  somewhat  puzzled  to  imagine  how 
the  pecuniary  problem,  in  this  somewhat  costly 
undertaking,  was  to  be  solved ;  and  I  said 
bluntly,  "  How  are  you  going  to  manage  it  ?" 

"  This  is  the  way  that  I  am  going  to  man- 
age it,"  answered  the  bishop,  throwing  down 
on  the  table  a  cheque  for  twenty-five  hund- 
red dollars.  The  cheque  was  drawn  by  the 
late  Mr.  Robert  Bonner,  proprietor,  at  that 
time,  of  the  New  York  Ledger. 

"  What  is  this  for?"  I  asked,  and  the  bishop 
answered  : 

"  For  twenty-five  articles  for  the  Ledger." 

"  Have  you  written  them  ?  "  I  asked. 


Bisbop  Clarfc  79 

"  Oh,  no,"  replied  the  bishop,  "  but  I  shall — 
some  of  them — while  on  shipboard." 

"  And  what  will  they  be  about  ?  "  I  per- 
sisted in  enquiring,  wondering  at  the  fertility 
which  could  so  surely  count  upon  itself. 

"  On  the  moral  uses  of  hairpins,  and  sub- 
jects of  that  character,"  said  the  bishop,  without 
the  ripple  of  a  smile  upon  his  grave  features. 

And,  if  one  had  followed  the  workings  of 
that  curiously  speculative  mind,  he  would  have 
been  amazed  to  find  from  how  many  sources, 
quite  as  humble  and  insignificant,  some  of  his 
gravest  reflections  sprang ! 

His  mind  had  in  one  word  that  rare  charm 
which  Martineau  somewhere  depicts  in  a  dis- 
course in  which  he  distinguishes  between  child- 
ishness and  childlikeness.  Bishop  Clark  never 
could  be  childish,  but,  in  that  almost  weird 
sense  of  wonder  which  all  things  in  heaven 
and  in  earth  seemed  to  awaken  in  him,  he 
could  touch  and  transform  the  lowliest  things 
of  life  and  make  them  pregnant  with  meaning 
to  every  age.  His  genius  was  never  ade- 
quately recognised,  but  it  will  never  be  forgot- 
ten by  those  who  felt  its  spell. 


Bishop  Core 


8x 


VI 

Coye 


THE    RIGHT    REVEREND    DR.   ARTHUR  CLEVELAND 
COXE,   BISHOP  OF  WESTERN  NEW  YORK 

HPHERE  lies  before  me  a  volume  of  Church 
History,  in  which  is  a  sketch  of  Bishop 
Coxe,  and  others  of  his  brethren  ;  and  the 
preface  makes  a  high  claim  for  its  painstaking 
statistical  accuracy.  I  have  not  the  smallest 
doubt  that  that  claim  is  abundantly  warranted 
by  the  exactness  and  precision  with  which 
every  date  has  been  cited,  and  every  product 
of  the  pen  of  an  exceptionally  prolific  author 
set  down.  But  to  call  that  history,  is  much  as 
though  one  should  place  on  the  table  before 
us  a  jar  containing  the  ashes  of  a  dead  friend, 
and  then  say,  "  Here  is  the  man  whom  you 
have  loved  and  lost."  One  would  be  some- 
thing more  or  less  than  human  if  he  did  not 
reply,  "  All  honour  to  these  sacred  manes  !  I 
cannot  look  at  yonder  vase  without  deep 
and  keen  emotion.  But  the  friend  whom  I 

83 


84  JSisbop  Coje 

have  lost — he  is  not  there  !  That  is  not  he  ! " 
And  something  like  that  must  needs  be  the 
instinctive  cry  of  any  one  who  reads  any  recol- 
lections of  Bishop  Coxe.  No  matter  how 
vivid  they  may  be,  he  was  somehow  more 
vital,  more  vivid,  more  engaging  !  No  matter 
how  familiarly  his  life  moved  along  wonted 
ecclesiastical  lines,  the  man  who  moved  within 
them  was  anything  but  familiar  or  common- 
place. He  had  a  keen  sense  of  decorum,  and 
he  never  forgot  to  bear  himself  as  became  his 
breeding  and  his  calling.  But  neither  of  these 
could  extinguish  in  him  that  rare  light  which 
marked  him  off  from  other  men,  and  which 
was  the  light  of  genius  !  I  have  been  told  that 
there  were  "  plain  people"  who  thought  him 
fanciful,  hyper-sensitive,  "  notional."  So  much 
the  worse,  then,  one  would  be  constrained  to 
say,  for  the  "  plain  people "  !  A  lark's  note, 
waking  one  out  of  a  stupid  and  heavy  sleep, 
has  been  regarded  as  an  impertinent  intru- 
sion ;  and  I  have  seen  very  worthy  but  very 
dull  men  in  the  House  of  Bishops  regarding 
Bishop  Coxe,  when  he  burst  into  some  fine 
frenzy,  almost  as  they  would  have  stared  at 
an  escaped  lunatic.  But  one  could  only  regret 
the  opacity  of  their  vision,  and  mourn  the  ab- 
sence, in  them,  of  the  gift  of  imagination. 


ri*tvr 

fcav*  lost— he  is  not  th<«  '  not  he  ! " 

And  something  1 
instinctive  cry  < 

lections   of  '..oxe.       INo 

vivid    th  ^  he   was  som* 

vital.  frvtd    -'tore  engaging  ' 

hov  rharly    In*  Hfe  moved  along  woated 

,1  -fc-al  lines,  the  man  who  moved  within 
«  *x  anything   --ui   familiar  or  common- 
Hr-  had  a  keen  srn   e  of  decorum,  and 
~f.>t  to.  bearhu:;'        as  became  his 
The  Riglit^ev^reixd  .:jlt,r  of  these 
Doctor  Arthur/Cleveland  Coxe, 

^ 

Bishop  of  Western,  ^ew^yprl^j  wluch 

From  a  photograph  by  Naegeli,  New  VQrkr  »o}(]  that 

:   ;.-,-MJ   him 
;...:.'.->oai.      bo  much 
*«mtti  be  constrained  to 
/tain  j«:«^le  "  !     A  lark's  note, 
wak,         -H»  4HU  of  a  stupid  and  heavy  sleep, 
has  vg^rded  as  an   impertinent  intru- 

sion s   i«iivc  seen  ver>'  worthy  but  very 

duil  the  House  of  Bishops  regarding 

I3ishi>  v^hr^   he  burst  into  so?r;< 

frenzy.  «   '^/  would  hav<      T"'vd  at 

an  escap.  Ci  ;--}  °^  coula  onl>'  re-ret 

the  opacitx  ami  mourn  the  ab- 
sence, in  incii 


Bisbop  Coje  85 

My  own  acquaintance  with  Bishop  Coxe  be- 
gan when  he  was  rector  of  Grace  Church, 
Baltimore,  in  the  vestry  of  which  was  a  gen- 
tleman who  was  a  friend  of  my  parents,  and  in 
whose  house,  when  I  was  an  undergraduate  in 
the  Theological  Seminary  of  Virginia,  I  was 
often  a  guest.  The  Rev.  Dr.  Coxe  was  an  in- 
timate and  honoured  friend  of  the  family,  and 
I  then  came  under  the  spell  of  a  personality 
which  had  a  singular  charm  and  attractiveness. 
At  that  time  the  courtlier  manners  of  our 
fathers  still  survived,  and  were  still  to  be  en- 
countered, at  any  rate,  among  the  clergy.  They 
had  not  been  conspicuous  among  my  theologi- 
cal preceptors,  though  these  were  men  of  rare 
benignity  and  of  noble  temper  :  and  I  confess 
that,  to  a  young  student  who  emerged,  now 
and  then,  from  a  somewhat  austere  and  un- 
ceremonious atmosphere,  there  was  something 
singularly  engaging  in  these  occasional  visits 
to  Baltimore,  with  its  fine  mixture  of  Southern 
warmth  and  stately  breeding  ;  and  in  the  de- 
lightful bearing  of  one  who,  Northerner  though 
he  was,  had  caught  its  best  traits,  and  was 
Persona  simpatica  (as  our  Italian  friends  say) 
with  its  best  social  ideals. 

But  nothing  would  be  more  unjust  than  to 
infer  from  this  that  Dr.  Coxe  was  simply  a 


86  J5isbop  Coje 

"  society  "  parson  ;  and  still  more  unjust  would 
be  the  conclusion  that  he  had  any  penchant  for 
that  somewhat  convivial  note  which,  when  I 
first  knew  it,  was  a  recognisable  characteristic 
of  a  charming  city.  A  friend,  himself  a  par- 
son, who,  as  a  great  host  of  friends  did,  en- 
joyed the  freedom  of  the  ever-hospitable  house 
to  which  I  have  referred,  told  me  this  story, 
which  is  both  illustrative  of  a  layman's  con- 
ception of  an  appropriate  expression  of  his 
devotion  to  his  pastor,  and  of  Dr.  Coxe's  in- 
difference in  any  convivial  direction.  The  di- 
vine to  whom  I  have  referred  arrived  at  his 
friend's  house  during  the  host's  absence,  and 
was  served,  through  the  kind  assiduity  of  the 
hostess,  with  the  best  in  the  house  that  she 
could  lay  her  hands  on.  After  a  day  or  two 
her  husband  returned,  and  she  said  to  him, 

"  Mr.    W ,   I    think    that   was   very  poor 

claret  that  you  left  out  for  Dr.  J ." 

"  It  was,"  answered  her  husband,  "  but  he  did 
not  know  it.  I  have  had  one  lesson  which  has 
taught  me  never  to  waste  anything  good  on 
the  clergy.  You  know  how  I  loved  Dr.  Coxe  : 
well,  when  he  left  Baltimore  I  gave  him  six 
bottles  of  that  X  Madeira.  You  know  its 
value.  It  was  priceless.  It  was  worth  its 
weight  in  gold ;  and  if  I  had  had  a  bottle 


JSisbop  Coje  87 

of  that  Madeira  at  my  right  hand  and  its  weight 
in  gold  on  the  left  I  would  have  taken  the 
Madeira !  As  you  will  remember,  I  was  in 
New  York  last  winter,  and  went,  one  day, 
to  Dr.  Coxe's  church.  He  saw  me,  and 
sent  the  sexton  to  ask  me,  after  service,  to 
come  into  the  rectory  to  lunch.  I  did  so,  and, 
at  table,  the  rector  pressed  upon  me  all  that  it 
offered,  until  at  length  I  said,  '  Thank  you,  I 
am  not  very  well — indeed  I  am  rather  faint  ; 
and  I  wonder,  Doctor,  if  I  could  have  a  glass  of 
that  Madeira  that  I  gave  you,  when  you  left 
Baltimore  ?  ' 

"  *  Certainly,'  said  the  rector,  turning  to  the 
lady  who  presided  at  the  other  end  of  the 
table ;  '  Lucy,  dear,  where  is  that  Madeira 
that  Mr.  W gave  us  ? ' 

"  '  Why,  don't  you  remember,  my  love  ?'  said 
the  lady  of  the  house ;  '  I  used  it  to  wash  the 
baby  with ! ' 

"Now  then,"  added  Mr.  W to  his  wife, 

"  do  you  think  that,  after  that,  I  am  going  to 
trouble  myself  to  set  out  anything  choice  for 
a  parson  ?  " 

And  most  hosts,  I  presume,  would  have 
agreed  with  him, — especially  if  the  subject  of 
these  recollections  had  been  the  guest,  for  no 


SB  Bisbop  Goje 

one  could  have  been  more  profoundly  indiffer- 
ent to  the  pleasures  of  the  table  than  he. 

For  decorum,  however,  he  had  a  most  scru- 
pulous regard ;  and  one  or  two  instances  of 
this  recur  to  me  which  were  pre-eminently 
characteristic.  The  General  Convention  of 
1871  sat  in  Baltimore,  and  its  most  distin- 
guished guest  was  Bishop  Selwyn,  then  Bishop 
of  Lichfield ;  but  first  of  all,  Bishop  of  New 
Zealand,  where  he  had  illustrated  a  heroism 
of  the  noblest  quality.  Bishop  Coxe,  whose 
admiration  for  everything  Anglican  was  a 
very  conspicuous  trait,  was  most  anxious  that 
everything  about  the  convention  should  be  as 
stately  and  refined  as  the  surroundings  in  the 
mother  country  to  which  the  distinguished 
guest  was  wonted ;  and  to  that  end  visited,  a 
few  hours  before  the  convention  opened,  the 
hall  in  which  the  bishops  were  to  sit.  In  its 
vestibule,  to  his  horror,  he  found,  stacked  up, 
two  or  three  dozens  of  "stone  China"  spit- 
toons ;  and,  rushing  into  the  hall,  he  called  out: 

"  Dr.  Potter,  have  you  seen  this  pyramid  of 
horrors  in  the  vestibule  ?  Surely,  you  are  not 
going  to  allow  them  to  be  brought  into  the 
House  of  Bishops  ?  Think  what  an  impression 
they  will  produce  upon  our  English  guest ! " 

"Alas,  my  dear   Bishop,"    I   answered,    "I 


JBisbop  Goje  89 

have  no  discretion  in  the  matter.  If  I  do 
not  provide  them  to-day,  I  shall  be  ordered  to 
do  so  to-morrow.  The  Bishops  of  A.  and  B. 
and  C.,  and  others,  will  refuse  to  be  deprived 
of  a  convenience  to  which  they  and  many 
others  have  long  been  accustomed." 

"  A  convenience  ! "  cried  the  bishop.  "  Is  it 
possible  that  we  are  such  a  tribe  of  savages  ! " 
and,  banging  the  door  behind  him,  he  vanished 
in  a  fine  rage. 

Of  course,  there  was  a  comic  side  to  all  this  ; 
but  it  was  none  the  less  the  chivalrous  sensi- 
bility of  a  finely  strung  nature,  often  unintelli- 
gible to  men  of  coarser  mould  ;  and  I  am  afraid 
that  we  jested  about  it,  sometimes,  after  a 
fashion  that  was  not  creditable.  One  escapade 
of  this  nature  I  can  now  recall  in  which  I  was 
the  chief  offender,  and  by  making  frank  con- 
fession of  it,  here,  I  may  perhaps,  in  part  at 
least,  atone  for  an  act  of  which  I  was  long  ago 
ashamed. 

During  a  General  Convention  which  sat  in 
New  York  while  I  was  secretary  of  the  House 
of  Bishops,  a  man  of  letters,  at  that  time  one 
of  the  editors  of  a  leading  periodical  still  widely 
read,  asked  a  number  of  bishops  to  dine  with 
him  at  the  Union  Club,  and  the  peals  of  laugh- 
ter which  distinguished  the  feast  found  their 


90  JSisbop  Coje 

way  down-stairs  to  the  ears  of  the  clubmen 
below.  One  of  these,  a  member  of  the  family 
with  which  Bishop  Coxe  was  staying,  gave  the 
bishop  an  account  of  the  occasion,  which  the 
bishop  brought  with  him  to  the  meeting  of 
the  House  next  morning.  He  repeated  it  to 
me  in  terms  which  seemed  to  me  exaggerated 
and  luridly  denunciatory.  "  The  thing  was  a 
grave  breach  of  ecclesiastical  propriety,  and 
the  bishops  who  had  been  guilty  of  it  should 
be  brought  to  the  bar  of  the  House  and  pub- 
licly reprimanded." 

The  whole  story  struck  me,  I  confess,  as 
grotesque  and  extravagant,  and  presented  an 
opportunity  for  ridicule  which,  to  the  presump- 
tion of  youth,  was  too  tempting  to  be  resisted. 
After  the  bishop,  therefore,  had  finished  his 
recital,  and  had  gone  to  his  seat,  or  rather  to 
two  or  three  adjacent  bishops,  to  whom  he  had 
repeated  the  story,  I  drew  up  a  mock  indict- 
ment, garnishing  it  with  certain  phrases  of  the 
bishop's,  easily  recognisable,  and  passed  it 
across  to  a  bishop  sitting  near  me.  After  ex- 
tracting from  it  the  mirth  which  it  afforded 
him,  he  handed  it  to  his  neighbour ;  and,  see- 
ing that  it  was  likely  to  "go  the  rounds,"  I 
turned  to  the  task  before  me.  Imagine,  if  you 
can,  my  horror  and  amazement,  when,  a  little 


JSisbop  Gore  91 

later,  feeling  a  hand  upon  my  shoulder,  I  looked 
up  and  saw  Bishop  Coxe  with  an  expression  of 
wrath  upon  his  face  which  froze  me  with  terror; 
and  my  unfortunate  paper  in  his  other  hand ! 
"  Dr.  Potter,"  he  whispered,  "  this  has  just 
been  handed  to  me  by  one  of  my  brethren" 
(I  never  have  been  able  to  discover  who  this 
episcopal  meddler  was)  "  and  it  was  written,  I 
suppose, — this  travesty  of  my  just  indignation, 
— by  some  bishop  in  this  House.  I  shall  bring 
it  to  the  notice  of  the  House,  and  demand  that 
its  author  declare  himself  ! "  I  looked  at  the 
bishop,  and  then  at  the  paper — in  which  I  may- 
say  that  I  had  not  made  the  slightest  effort  to 
disguise  my  handwriting, — and  caught  desper- 
ately at  the  one  loop-hole  of  escape.  "  Do 
you  think,  Bishop,"  I  said,  "  that  such  a  thing 
as  that  is  worthy  of  your  notice  ?  Do  you 
care  to  betray  to  the  House  of  Bishops  that 
you  can  be  hurt  by  such  a  production  as  that  ? 
Do  nothing  about  it,  now,  and  leave  the  whole 
matter  until  after  recess,  when,  I  am  persuaded, 
you  will  feel  that  that  paper  deserves  only 
your  contempt.  Meanwhile,  leave  it  with  me." 
The  bishop  left  me,  and  returned,  with  troubled 
countenance,  to  his  seat.  So  soon  as  the  hour 
of  recess  came,  I  took  the  wretched  paper  into 
the  back-yard  and  burnt  it.  Do  you  think  you 


92  Bisbop  Goje 

would  like  to  have  been  in  my  place  when, 
after  recess,  I  saw  the  bishop  rise  from  his  seat 
and  approach  mine?  He  placed  his  hand  on 
my  shoulder,  and  bent  over  me  to  demand,  as 
I  tremblingly  anticipated,  the  return  of  the 
paper.  But  no.  Instead,  he  said,  "  Dr.  Potter, 
you  are  a  wise  man.  That  paper  was  unworthy 
of  my  notice.  Destroy  it,  if  you  will.  I  shall 
concern  myself  no  further  about  it."  And  the 
incident  was  happily  concluded. 

But  I  shall  regret  having  recalled  it  if  any 
who  may  read  it,  now,  shall  fail  to  see  in  it, 
comic  as  were  some  of  its  aspects,  that  fine 
sense  of  fitness  which  lent  to  all  that  Bishop 
Coxe  was  and  did,  a  supreme  charm.  Like 
another  of  whom  the  Scriptures  speak,  he  was 
"  very  jealous "  for  all  that  concerned  the 
honour  of  his  high  calling  ;  and  through  all 
that  he  said  and  was,  there  shone  the  lustre  of  a 
courage  as  heroic  as  it  was  unfamiliar.  Ridicule, 
vituperation,  clamour — they  could  not  turn 
him  aside  ;  and  when  the  Church  lost  him  it 
lost  not  alone  its  foremost  poet,  a  rare  scholar, 
an  untiring  prelate,  a  pre-eminently  pictur- 
esque figure  upon  the  canvas  of  its  chequered 
history,  but,  most  of  all,  a  moral  hero  ! 


Bishop  Wilmet 


93 


THE    RIGHT    REVEREND     DR.    JOSEPH    PERE    BELL 
WILMER,    BISHOP    OF    LOUISIANA 

DURING  the  General  Convention  of  1895, 
which  sat  in  the  city  of  Minneapolis, 
Minn.,  I  remember  very  well  being-  arrested  in 
some  task  in  which  at  the  moment  I  was  en- 
gaged, by  two  figures  that,  in  eager  conversa- 
tion, were  withdrawing  from  the  House  of 
Bishops  —  the  Bishop  of  Western  New  York, 
the  Right  Reverend  Arthur  Cleveland  Coxe, 
and  the  Bishop  of  Minnesota,  the  Right  Rev- 
erend Henry  Benjamin  Whipple.  Standing 
near  me,  at  the  moment,  was  a  junior  bishop 
who  had  but  just  taken  his  seat  in  the  House 
for  the  first  time,  and  to  whom  most  of  its 
members  were  unknown. 

"  Look  at  those  two  men,"  I  said,  "  for  they 
represent  our  most  picturesque  element. 
There  are  other  bishops  in  this  House  as 
learned,  as  devout,  as  self-sacrificing,  as  they. 

95 


96  JSisbop  lUtlmcr 

But  none  of  them  is  picturesque.  Bishops 
Coxe  and  Whipple  are  picturesque." 

If  my  right  reverend  junior  had  entered 
the  House  of  Bishops  a  few  years  earlier,  he 
would  have  found  there  a  bishop  who  died  in 
1878,  and  who,  in  some  respects  more  pictur- 
esque than  either  of  those  whom  I  have 
named,  was  indeed  one  of  the  most  interesting 
and  charming  illustrations  that  the  House  has 
known  of  qualities  that  were  neither  mechani- 
cal, nor  commonplace. 

Joseph  Pere  Bell  Wilmerwas  born  early  in 
the  nineteenth  century,  in  New  Jersey ;  but 
his  ancestry  was  Southern,  and  he  early  found 
his  way  to  Virginia,  where  he  was  a  student 
both  at  the  University  of  Virginia  and  the 
Alexandria  Seminary.  Here,  in  1834,  he  was 
ordained  deacon  by  Bishop  Richard  Chan- 
ning  Moore,  and  later,  by  the  same  prelate,  a 
priest.  His  earliest  rectorship  was  at  Albe- 
marle,  Virginia,  from  which  he  went,  later,  to 
the  University  of  the  State  as  chaplain,  and 
later  (in  1839)  mto  tne  United  States  Navy. 
Four  years  later  he  resigned  his  office  as  Navy 
chaplain,  and  became  a  rector  in  Virginia. 
When  I  first  knew  him  I  was  a  child,  and  he 
was  rector  of  St.  Mark's  Church,  Philadelphia, 
in  my  father's  diocese. 


96  Btebop  "Catlmer 

But    none    of   them    is  picturesque.      Bishops 
Coxe  and  Whippie  are  picturesque." 

H  ray  rij^ht  reverend  junior  had  entered 
the  House  of  Bishops  a  few  years  earlier,  he 
would  iuivt-  found  there  a  bishop  who  died  in 
1878,  and  who,  in  some  respects  more  pictur- 
esque than  either  of  those  whom  I  have 
named,  was  indeed  one  of  the  most  interesting 
and  charming  illustrations  that  the  House  has 
known  of  qualities  that  were  neither  mechani- 
cal, nor  commonplace. 

The  Right  Reverend 
Doctor  Joseph  Pere> Bell  Wilmer.rmt 
Brshdp  of  '•  Louisiana* -u 

S    i  Proki  *  Colograf*  by  WastoMrn,  New  Orlbifisde nt 

both  at  the    University  o*    \'  rr,-!n   .    r«d 

Alexandria  Seminary.  -\H.  ^  was 

ordained    deacon    by   l>>  v^luird    Chan- 

nin^  Moore,  and  lai<      bv  :n<    same  prelate,  a 

pru  st.      His  earliest   r^ct*.>rship  was  at  Albe- 

mari«;.  Virginia,  from  which  he  went,  later,  to 

t:'\t    \  nivrrsity  of   the  State  as  chaplain,  and 

latrr  (in  ^839)  into  the  United   States  Navy. 

our  years  later  he  resigned  his  office  as  Navy 

hapiam.    and   became   a    rector   in  Virginia. 

Wh«»  1  first  knew  him  I  was  a  child,  and  he 

«  rector  of  St.  Mark's  Church,  Philadelphia, 

v  father's  diocese. 


Bisbop  Wilmer  97 

Already,  then,  I  became  sensible,  mere  lad 
though  I  was,  of  a  certain  "aloofness"  in  him, 
which  made  one  conscious  that  he  was  a  per- 
son wont  to  commune  with  high  thoughts  and 
themes,  and  not  easily  descending  to  common- 
place men  and  thoughts.  I  shall  have  gravely 
misrepresented  him,  if  it  is  inferred  from  this 
that  he  was  cold,  or  supercilious,  or  in  any  way 
distant.  Nothing  could  be  farther  from  the 
fact.  The  first  impression  which  one  derived 
from  him  was  of  his  singular  gentleness,  ten- 
derness, and  benignity.  He  could  not  be  frigid 
or  reserved ;  but  one  was  often  sensible  that, 
when  his  attention  was  summoned  to  ordinary 
things,  he  was  like  one  who  "  came  down  from 
the  mount." 

And  mixed  with  all  this  was  a  touch  of 
matchless  humour,  which  was  all  the  more 
potential  because  so  absolutely  unconscious. 
On  one  occasion,  when  the  House  of  Bishops 
was  sitting  in  special  session  in  Philadelphia 
for  the  purpose  of  filling  two  or  three  vacancies 
in  the  missionary  episcopate,  that  body  was 
treated  to  a  series  of  nominations  of  very  young 
and  wholly  unknown  men,  by  bishops  who,  be- 
cause their  nominees  were  so  little  known  to 
the  House,  were  tempted  to  describe  them  and 
their  gifts  in  somewhat  extravagant  language. 


98  JSisbop  Milmer 

After  the  nominations  were  concluded,  the 
House,  in  accordance  with  its  custom,  ad- 
journed. An  opportunity  was  thus  afforded 
for  private  enquiry ;  and  the  election  occurred 
next  morning.  Just  before  we  were  about  to 
proceed  to  it,  Bishop  Wilmer  rose  in  his  place, 
and,  with  a  manner  of  awe-inspiring  solemnity, 
began: 

"  Mr.  President,  yesterday  afternoon  in  undertaking 
to  return  to  this  House,  I  lost  my  way.  [No  one  was 
surprised  at  this,  knowing  the  abstracted  and  unob- 
servant habits  of  the  bishop.]  In  seeking  to  recover 
it  [he  went  on],  I  wandered  into  a  graveyard,  and 
found  myself  reading  the  inscriptions  upon  the  tomb- 
stones. It  was  evidently  the  place  where  the  good 
Philadelphians  are  buried;  and  such  an  assemblage  of 
the  great  and  virtuous,  1  said  to  myself,  I  had  never 
encountered.  But,  as  I  said  so,  I  remembered  the 
panegyrics  to  which  I  had  listened,  yesterday  morning, 
in  this  House; — remembered  them,  and  realised  that  it 
is  not  always  necessary  for  ordinary  and  commonplace 
people  to  be  dead  in  order  to  be  over-praised  !  " 

And  then,  as  if  the  graver  aspect  of  the  sub- 
ject had  suddenly  broken  upon  him,  the  bishop 
added,  with  a  fine  burst  of  passion: 

"  Sir,  I  am  tired  of  these  extravagant  eulogies  upon 
these  unknown  and  insignificant  boys  !  The  Church  has 
no  use,  either  in  the  missionary  field  or  anywhere  else,  for 
these  Tulchan-bishops,  —  these  calf  bishops,  as  they 


JSfsbop  TKHUmer  99 

would  be,  if  elected;  and,  for  myself,  sir  [said  the  bishop, 
sweeping  the  House  with  an  eye  that  flashed  fire,  and 
pausing  as  his  look  caught  the  upturned  face  of  Bishop 
Arthur  Cleveland  Coxe,  of  Western  New  York],  for  my- 
self, sir,  if  the  Church  needs  more  missionary  bishops 
I  want  such  bishops  as  my  brother,  yonder — the  Bishop 
of  Buffalo,  as  he  ought  to  be  called,  as  he  goes  up  and 
down  his  diocese  tossing  his  horns  at  Puritan  and  Papist 
alike !  " 

The  bishop  took  his  seat,  and  the  young 
nominees  were  not  elected.  But,  before  we 
adjourned,  the  elegant  and  gracious  Bishop 
of  Western  New  York,  whose  only  claim  to  be 
called  the  "  Bishop  of  Buffalo  "  consisted  in  the 
fact  that  he  lived  in  that  city,  came  to  the 
secretary's  table,  and,  putting  his  hand  on  my 
shoulder,  whispered,  "  Dr.  Potter,  do  I  look 
like  a  buffalo  ? " 

The  vagrant  instincts  of  Bishop  Wilmer  did 
not  always  content  themselves  with  obstructive 
activities.  I  recall  an  incident  which  occurred 
just  after  our  Civil  War,  and  which  was 
strikingly  illustrative  of  qualities  in  the  bishop 
as  rare  as  they  were  noble.  Bishop  Wilmer 
was  chosen  to  succeed  the  lamented  Polk,  just 
at  the  conclusion  of  the  Civil  War ;  and  the 
General  Convention  which  met  in  New  York  in 
October,  1868,  was  the  first  at  which  he  was 
present  after  his  consecration,  two  years  earlier. 


ioo  JSfsbop  TTCUlmer 

It  was  not,  in  many  respects,  a  congenial 
assemblage  to  the  bishop.  The  tragic  events 
of  the  Civil  War  were  too  recent,  the  South,  in 
her  broken  and  impoverished  condition,  was 
made,  in  too  many  ways,  painfully  conscious 
of  the  poverty  and  feebleness  of  the  Church  in 
the  South,  as  her  bishops,  clergy,  and  laity 
gathered  in  brilliant  New  York ;  and  Bishop 
Wilmer  was  pre-eminently  a  Southerner.  As 
a  consequence,  the  House  of  Bishops  saw  very 
little  of  him.  He  would  appear  in  his  place 
in  the  morning ;  answer  to  his  name,  when  it 
was  called;  assist  in  the  devotions  of  the  day ; 
and  then,  after  lingering  a  little,  with  a  face 
pathetic  in  its  sadness,  and  pre-eminently  ex- 
pressive in  its  utter  absence  of  any  token  of 
interest  in  the  business  of  the  hour,  quietly 
steal  away.  The  rest  of  the  morning  and  the  af- 
ternoon were  spent  in  wandering  about  the 
streets  with  an  air  which  those  who  met  him 
described  as  indicating  infinite  weariness  and 
ennui.  But  his  mind  was  not  vacant,  nor  his 
purpose  without  aim.  On  one  such  occasion, 
a  passerby  observed  him  standing  in  front  of  a 
great  commercial  house,  and  staring  up  at  its 
stately  proportions  with  an  air  which  might, 
not  unnaturally,  have  been  described  as  one  of 
vacant  curiosity.  After  a  few  moments'  hesi- 


ffiisbop  Wilmer  101 

tation,  he  entered  the  building,  asked  for  the 
proprietor,  and  sent  in  his  name.  As  it  hap- 
pened, the  great  merchant  was  disengaged,  re- 
ceived the  bishop  courteously,  and,  albeit  with 
some  amusement  at  first,  listened  to  him  pa- 
tiently. For  the  bishop,  as  those  who  knew 
him  will  remember  was  not  infrequently  his 
custom,  began  to  generalise.  Here  about  him 
he  saw,  he  said,  the  evidences  of  a  vast  busi- 
ness, and  was  warranted,  he  presumed,  in  infer- 
ring from  it  large  returns  and  great  wealth. 
But  wealth,  like  any  other  human  power,  or 
possession,  implied  stewardship ;  and  large 
stewardship  involved  large  peril.  The  inter- 
view ended  with  a  personal  application  of  the 
whole  argument,  of  infinite  tenderness  and  di- 
rectness. The  merchant,  who,  it  may  be  said, 
by  the  way,  was  not  an  irreligious  man,  but  a 
church-goer,  and  then,  at  any  rate,  a  man  of 
exemplary  walk  and  conversation,  said,  later, 
in  recounting  this  incident,  "In  all  my  life,  no 
one  ever  spoke  to  me  like  that ! "  The  issue 
of  this  interview,  an  issue  that  most  vividly 
expressed,  to  many  minds,  the  profound  im- 
pression which  it  made,  was  a  gift  of  princely 
munificence  to  a  diocese  contiguous  to  New 
York  for  the  erection  and  endowment  of  a 
cathedral. 


loa  JBisbcp  lUilmcr 

The  informality  which  distinguished  his 
action  in  seeking  this  merchant,  and  speaking 
to  him  as  he  did,  was  pre-eminently  character- 
istic of  Bishop  Wilmer.  He  had  a  sublime  in- 
difference to  mere  conventionalisms,  and  that  it 
was  not  customary  to  break  in  upon  a  man  of 
business  in  order  to  press  upon  his  attention 
great  spiritual  considerations  did  not  influence 
him  in  the  smallest  degree.  It  was  the  same  trait 
of  which  I  had  an  eminently  characteristic  illus- 
tration a  few  years  later.  I  happened  to  be  in 
New  Orleans  during  the  session  of  the  Diocesan 
Convention;  and,  after  dining  with  the  bishop, 
was  asked  to  accompany  him  to  an  evening 
session  of  the  convention.  It  was  a  wild  night 
when  we  set  out,  with  the  rain  descending  in  tor- 
rents ;  and  as  we  neared  the  church  in  which 
the  convention  was  to  assemble,  we  were  obliged 
to  cross  the  street.  I  do  not  know  how  it  may 
be  now,  but,  in  those  days,  the  drainage  of  New 
Orleans  was  surface-drainage — at  any  rate  so 
far  as  the  rainfall  was  concerned  ;  and,  in  order 
to  meet  those  very  frequent  emergencies  when 
the  wide  and  deep  gutters  on  each  side  of  the 
street  were  swollen  with  water,  stepping-stones 
were  provided,  by  means  of  which  one  could 
cross  the  street.  We  started  to  do  this,  but 
alas,  the  bishop  was  absorbed  in  an  animated 


Bisbop  mumcr  103 

narration,  and  turning,  for  the  moment,  missed 
his  footing,  and,  literally,  disappeared  in  the 
flood.  So  soon  as  was  possible,  I  seized  him  and 
dragged  him  out,  drenched  and  dripping,  of 
course,  and  without  a  dry  stitch  upon  him. 

"You  must  go  home,  sir,  and  change  your 
clothes! "  I  exclaimed,  so  soon  as  I  could  com- 
mand breath  to  speak. 

"  Not  at  all,"  answered  the  bishop.  "It  is 
too  late  for  that ;  and,  moreover,  I  read  my 
annual  address  this  evening.  I  must  borrow 
from  the  neighbourhood  what  I  need.  " 

It  was  a  long  way  back  to  the  bishop's 
house ;  and  if  it  had  not  been,  it  was  plain 
that  the  bishop  was  determined  not  to  return 
thither.  So  we  hurried  on  to  the  vestry  room 
of  the  church,  where  the  bishop  removed  his 
dripping  garments,  and  put  on  such  as  his 
courteous  lay  neighbours  provided. 

Their  colour  and  shape  were  not  material, 
for,  over  all,  the  bishop  was  to  wear  his  robes  ; 
but  their  size  involved  a  very  serious  problem, 
for  the  average  Southerner  was  "  slim "  and 
slender  of  figure,  while  the  bishop's  girth  was 
portly  and — considerable.  However,  by  some 
simple  ingenuity,  we  overcame  this  difficulty  ; 
and  as  I  had  known  the  bishop  since  I  was  a 
boy,  he  was  amiable  enough  to  allow  me  to 


104  Bisbop 

secure  his  trousers  and  other  nether-garments 
by  a  contrivance  of  loops  of  string  which 
girthed  him  sufficiently  for  any  ordinary 
emergency. 

Yes ;  but  not  for  an  extraordinary  emer- 
gency !  The  bishop  delivered  his  address  from 
a  platform  ;  and  as  questions  of  ritual  were,  at 
the  moment,  much  in  the  air,  he  discussed 
them  with  an  impassioned  oratory  which  all 
who  knew  him  will  remember.  I  had  fol- 
lowed him  into  the  church,  and  had  taken  my 
seat  in  a  pew,  not  unnaturally  somewhat 
elated  at  the  success  of  my  sartorial  ingenuity. 
But  my  elation  was  of  brief  duration.  With 
every  moment  the  bishop  became  more  im- 
passioned ;  his  action  more  vehement;  the  move- 
ments of  his  swaying  and  vibrating  figure  more 
pronounced  and  saltatory,  until  I  found  myself 
watching  him  in  a  cold  perspiration,  and  anti- 
cipating with  horror  the  dreaded  moment  when 
a  string  should  break  !  Fortunately,  it  did  n't. 

It  has  been  my  good  fortune,  in  searching 
for  information  in  regard  to  Bishop  Wilmer's 
earlier  life,  to  find,  in  the  recollections  of 
his  son,  William  N.  Wilmer,  Esq.,  a  lay- 
man of  New  York  of  rare  gifts  and  engag- 
ing character,  most  valued  help,  for  which 
I  desire  here  to  make  grateful  acknowl- 


IBisbop  Milmer  105 

edgment.       Says    Mr.    Wilmer,    speaking    of 
his  father  : 

"While  no  lengthy  sketch  of  the  Right  Rev.  J.  P. 
B.  Wilmer,  sometime  Bishop  of  Louisiana,  was  ever 
written,  yet  some  of  the  characteristics  of  his  life  have 
been  perpetuated  by  certain  experiences  that  have  been 
recalled  by  his  contemporaries  and  others  with  whom  he 
was  associated  during  his  long  and  varied  career.  Some 
of  these  incidents  or  anecdotes  illustrate  not  only  his 
deep  faith  and  devotion  to  the  cause  of  religion,  but  also 
illustrate  his  broadness  and  practical  methods  in  dealing 
with  humanity. 

"  There  was  nothing  unusual  in  Bishop  Wilmer's  boy- 
hood, which  was  largely  spent  on  the  Eastern  shore  of 
Maryland.  As  a  boy  he  went  for  a  time  to  school  in 
Philadelphia,  and  as  the  relatives  with  whom  he  was 
staying  attended  rather  a  fashionable  church,  young 
Wilmer  acquired  a  great  distaste  for  church  and  relig- 
ion; but  later  on,  when  he  was  again  at  Philadelphia  at- 
tending school,  he  was  with  people  who  went  to  a  very 
humble  church  where  the  congregation  was  composed 
largely  of  poor  people.  It  was  at  this  time  that  religion 
appeared  to  him  in  a  different  light,  and  he  first  began 
to  look  upon  it  from  a  different  standpoint.  While  his  dis- 
taste and  distrust  of  religion  was  first  changed  under  the 
influence  of  this  humble  little  church,  and  the  example 
of  this  poor  but  earnest  congregation,  yet  he  did  not 
finally  decide  to  go  into  the  ministry  until  several  years 
thereafter.  And  it  was  the  recollection  of  this  little, 
humble  parish  and  congregation,  and  the  reality  of 
religion  that  was  there  presented,  which  developed  in 
him  a  desire  to  be  a  minister. 


io6  JSisbop  1U  timer 

"  As  illustrating  his  boyish  character,  it  is  told  of  him 
that  on  one  occasion  he  had  at  college,  a  difference  with 
a  young  man,  whose  conduct  young  Wilmer  thought 
was  so  reprehensible  that  he  should  either  apologise  or  be 
punished;  consequently,  as  the  fairest  means  of  adjusting 
such  differences,  it  was  agreed  that  young  Wilmer  and  his 
opponent  should  meet  and  settle  the  matter  in  the  usual 
way  that  boys  adopt.  The  day  before  the  meeting,  the 
young  man  came  to  Wilmer,  and  announced  that,  as  he 
had  to  go  away,  a  friend  would  take  his  place  in  settling 
their  differences.  Thereupon  Wilmer  replied  that  it  was 
not  a  matter  that  required  any  delay,  and  that  such  sug- 
gestion of  a  substitute  was  an  evidence  of  cowardice,  as 
well  as  of  impudence.  He  took  the  young  man  by  the 
neck,  and  very  quickly  it  was  apparent  that  no  delay  or 
substitute  was  necessary,  and  the  young  man  quickly  re- 
pented of  his  wrong-doing.  It  is  needless  to  say  that 
Wilmer's  attitude  was  approved  by  his  fellow-students. 
With  the  same  promptness  that  he  had  punished  this 
young  man  he  likewise  made  up  with  him,  and  was  ever 
ready  to  aid  him  in  case  of  need.  These  incidents  are 
merely  recalled  to  show  the  early  qualities  of  the  char- 
acter of  this  earnest  man,  and  to  show  that  in  early  life 
he  had  the  same  weaknesses  and  shortcomings  as  other 
boys. 

"  Bishop  Wilmer's  early  ministry  began  as  a  missionary 
in  the  mountains  of  Virginia;  then  he  was  a  chaplain  in 
the  Navy;  afterwards  he  had  a  church  on  the  Eastern  shore 
of  Virginia;  later  he  was  rector  of  St.  Mark's  Church, 
Philadelphia ;  and  his  life  closed  as  Bishop  of 
Louisiana.  While  Bishop  Wilmer  was  of  a  nervous, 
active  temperament,  yet  in  hours  of  danger  he  showed 
unusual  calmness  and  self-control.  It  is  told  of  him  by 


Blsbop  Wilmer  107 

one  of  his  old  associates  who  was  with  him  on  a  voyage, 
that,  in  the  midst  of  a  great  storm,  when  the  ship  was 
being  tossed  about  by  a  heavy  sea  and  the  passengers 
were  consequently  in  a  state  of  great  excitement  (for  it 
was  generally  considered  that  the  situation  was  very 
dangerous),  the  bishop  took  up  a  very  prominent  position 
on  the  deck  and  began  reading  a  newspaper.  The 
effect  on  the  passengers  was  quite  magical,  and  so 
quickly  diverted  attention  and  produced  such  a  change 
of  feeling,  that,  when  all  danger  was  passed,  the  captain 
came  forward  and  thanked  him  for  his  wonderful  self- 
control  and  self-forgetfulness,  and  their  consequent  effect 
on  the  other  people.  It  is  stated  that  Mr.  Wilmer,  with 
a  smile  on  his  face,  and  in  his  rather  inimitable  way, 
turned  to  the  captain  and  said:  'It  was  well,  Captain, 
that  my  fellow-passengers  did  not  examine  the  situation 
too  closely;  for  they  might  have  discovered  that  my 
newspaper  was  turned  upside  down; — therefore  I  deserve 
no  credit  for  what  was  only  feigned  courage.' 

"  This  incident  is  merely  referred  to  as  illustrating  the 
readiness  of  the  bishop  to  rise  to  emergencies,  and  to  be 
helpful  on  all  occasions,  and  yet  modestly  to  disdain 
credit,  as  his  subsequent  career  disclosed.  In  his  very 
watchful  care  and  guidance  of  his  sons  he  always  tried 
to  impress  upon  them  the  importance  of  self-forgetful- 
ness,  and  to  spur  them  on  to  attempt  what  might  be  con- 
sidered, even  by  others,  impossible.  When  one  of  his 
boys  had  gone  through  a  very  severe  ordeal  and  struggle 
he  wrote  him  as  follows: 

'  Whatever  I  have  done  in  life  to  aid  my  fellows  has 
usually  been  the  result  of  overcoming  the  severest  ob- 
stacles; and  I  would  urge  you,  my  dear  boy,  to  struggle, 
and  never  to  turn  back  or  away  from  what  is  said  to  be 


io8  3Bisbop  Wilmer 

impossible.  In  fact,  "  the  impossible  "  is  what  may  often 
most  need  your  strength,  your  self-forgetfulness,  and 
your  courage.' 

"  The  bishop  was  a  man  who  was  ever  ready  to  give 
his  sympathy  to  those  in  need,  and  was  always  on  the 
alert  to  help  the  helpless  or  defend  the  defenceless.  It 
is  told  of  him  that,  on  one  occasion  when  he  was  travel- 
ling on  the  railroad,  he  noticed  the  conductor  treating 
a  poor,  humble  woman  rather  rudely;  whereupon  the 
bishop  interceded,  and  in  a  kind  and  friendly  way  en- 
deavoured to  see  if  he  could  not  do  something  to  help 
both  the  woman  and  the  conductor.  But  the  conductor 
replied  in  a  somewhat  abusive  tone;  and  thereupon  the 
bishop,  taking  in  the  situation  at  a  glance,  stated  with 
considerable  firmness  that  he  intended  to  protect  the 
woman  and  that,  in  due  time,  the  conductor  would  have 
to  look  for  some  other  occupation.  He  then  gave  the 
conductor  his  address  so  that  he  might  understand  from 
whom  to  expect  a  complaint.  Within  twelve  hours  the 
conductor  was  removed  from  his  position,  and  came  to 
the  bishop  for  aid,  and  as  might  be  expected,  the  bishop, 
feeling  the  man  had  received  a  lesson,  worked  with  the 
same  earnest  determination  to  have  this  reformed  con- 
ductor reinstated,  as  he  had  worked  to  protect  the  poor 
woman.  The  conductor  was  reinstated,  a  better  and  a 
wiser  man. 

"  In  great  emergencies  the  bishop  was  always  on  the 
alert,  and  rose  to  the  occasion;  and  his  courage,  his 
sympathy,  and  sense  of  humour  all  combined  to  enable 
him  to  take  advantage  of  any  opportunity  that  needed 
these  qualities,  separately,  or  collectively.  On  one  occa- 
'sion,  during  the  great  railway  strike  in  Pennsylvania, 
when  he  was  called  North,  on  a  hurried  trip,  the  train 


Bisbop  Milmer  109 

upon  which  he  was  came  suddenly  to  a  stop  near  Pitts- 
burg,  and  it  was  soon  apparent  that  the  strikers,  and  the 
sympathisers  with  the  strikers,  had  all  gathered  around 
the  train,  where  they  were  everywhere  in  evidence,  and  re- 
fused to  allow  the  train  to  proceed  or  return.  The  bishop 
was  in  the  rear  coach,  and  soon  saw  the  situation.  He 
went  to  the  rear  platform,  and  after  removing  his  hat,  re- 
mained silent  for  a  few  moments;  raised  his  voice  in 
strong  tones,  so  as  to  attract  attention,  and  asked  the 
crowd  if  they  would  allow  him  to  tell  them  a  story. 
While  the  bishop  was  not  a  tall  man,  yet  he  had  rather  a 
commanding  presence,  and  his  personality  and  presence 
was  the  more  striking  and  forcible  whenever  he  was  in 
the  midst  of  danger,  for  there  was  a  firmness  and  fear- 
lessness in  manner  as  well  as  in  voice,  that  invited  im- 
mediate attention.  After  quiet  was  somewhat  restored, 
the  bishop  said:  'I  have  just  come  from  a  country 
where  we  had  some  trouble  not  long  ago  [meaning  the 
South,  and  referring  to  the  War],  and  it  was  a  kind 
of  trouble  that  we  do  not  want  again,  for  we  were 
whipped,  and  many  of  you  must  have  done  the  whip- 
ping. So  you  can  understand  that  I  am  rather  afraid  of 
troubles  of  this  sort,  but  my  position  here  to-day  re- 
minds me  of  a  story  which  I  have  lately  heard,  and 
which  may  enable  you  to  sympathise  with  me.  As  you 
know,  we  have  a  great  many  coloured  people  down  in 
my  country;  and  they  are  beginning  to  be  educated, 
and,  consequently,  they  like  to  use  great,  big  words, 
whether  such  words  have  any  meaning  or  not.  Some 
time  ago  I  heard  of  a  coloured  preacher,  who  was  scold- 
ing his  congregation  in  language  which  neither  he  nor 
they  exactly  understood,  but  he  closed  by  saying  that  in 
life  there  were  only  two  roads  to  take,  and  he  exhorted 
his  hearers  to  make  their  selecvion  then  and  there. 


no  JSfsbop 

"  One  road,"  he  said,  "  leads  to  perdition,  and  the  other 
road  leads  to  damnation."  Whereupon  an  old  coloured 
brother  in  the  far  end  of  the  church  rose  up  and  called 
out:  "  If  dem  is  the  roads,  den  I  '11  take  to  the  woods." 
'Now,'  said  the  bishop,  '  this  is  just  my  position.  I  un- 
derstand that  these  are  the  only  roads  that  I  now  have 
before  me,  for  the  reason  that  you  are  unwilling  that  we 
should  go  up  the  track,  or  down  the  track,  so  I  do  not 
know  what  to  do.  It  is  needless  to  say  that  I  would  be 
very  grateful  to  you  if  you  would  n't  force  me  and  my 
friends  to  take  to  the  woods.'  With  a  smile,  but  with  a 
somewhat  earnest  expression,  the  bishop  replaced  his  hat 
and  bowed  to  the  crowd,  which  sent  up  a  deafening  cheer 
and  soon  the  order  was  issued  that  '  the  bishop's  train  ' 
should  proceed,  and  it  did  proceed,  and  it  was  the  only 
train  that  passed  over  the  road  for  several  days. 

"  While  the  bishop  was  a  man  of  great  firmness,  and 
ready  to  face  danger  in  any  form,  yet  he  was  as  simple 
as  a  child,  and  his  very  simplicity  and  his  faith  in 
human  nature,  as  well  as  in  the  Great  Creator,  often 
enabled  him  to  do  things  which  seemed  impossible  to 
others.  Like  many  men  of  his  type,  he  was  very  forget- 
ful and  absent-minded,  and  very  frequently  lost  papers. 
On  one  occasion,  when  he  went  to  England  to  attend  the 
Pan- Anglican  Conference,  he  found  he  had  left  his  letter 
of  credit  at  home.  The  other  bishops  with  him  asked  him 
what  he  was  going  to  do  about  it.  He  said :  '  I  '11  just  go 
to  the  bankers,  and  ask  them  to  give  me  another.'  The 
bishops  laughed  at  the  idea,  and  declared  that  it  would  be 
impossible  for  him  to  get  such  a  favor  from  them.  Several 
of  them  went  with  him  to  the  bank,  and  remained  in  the 
waiting-room,  curious  to  see  the  result.  Before  long 
the  bishop  came  out.  '  Well  ? '  questioned  the  bishops. 
'  They  gave  me  the  letter,'  he  said,  '  and  have  tele- 


Bisbop  WUmer  m 

graphed  the  banker  in  the  United  States.'  'Well,  we 
are  surprised,'  they  said,  '  but  you  look  so  like  a  bishop 
that  they  could  not  refuse  you.' 

"  It  was  not  that  he  looked  so  much  like  a  bishop,  but 
that  he  had  such  an  earnest,  trustful  expression,  as  well 
as  magnetic  presence,  that  it  seemed  impossible  for  any 
one  to  refuse  any  appeal  that  he  should  make.  He 
trusted  others,  and  others  could  not  refuse  the  tempta- 
tion to  trust  him.  He  received  back  what  he  gave  forth. 
His  innocency  of  life,  and  purity  of  thought,  made  him 
a  most  sympathetic  and  helpful  companion  of  those  in 
trouble;  and  his  self-forgetfulness,  and  his  vigorous 
courage,  made  him  an  irresistible  antagonist  of  the  wrong- 
doer. While  he  was  deeply  absorbed  with  the  spiritual 
life  and  religious  growth  of  Louisiana,  yet  he  did  not 
flinch  from  any  responsibility  in  any  practical  matters 
that  seemed  to  be  for  the  best  interest  of  the  State,  or 
the  people  at  large.  During  the  Reconstruction  period 
in  Louisiana,  when  there  was  great  danger  of  bloodshed, 
at  a  time  when  Carpet-bag  government  was  in  existence, 
it  seemed  necessary  that  some  one  not  identified  with  the 
political  or  partisan  interests  in  the  State  should  come 
forward  and  present  the  matter  to  General  Grant  and 
President-elect  Hayes.  At  this  juncture,  some  of  the 
Judges  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  Louisiana  and  other 
prominent  persons  appealed  to  Bishop  Wilmer  to  go  to 
Washington  and  see  President  Grant.  While  many  peo- 
ple urged  the  bishop  not  to  participate  in  what  seemed 
to  be  a  strictly  secular  or  worldly  work,  yet  he  did  not 
hesitate,  as  soon  as  he  realised  that  it  might  be  a  call  to 
duty;  so  he  promptly  went  to  Washington  and  saw  Gen- 
eral Grant,  and  then  to  Columbus,  Ohio,  and  saw  Presi- 
dent-elect Hayes;  and  the  private  letters  which  Bishop 


ii2  JSisbop  UUlilmcr 

Wilmer  received,  some  of  them  addressed  to  President- 
elect Hayes  and  others  written  by  him,  clearly 
indicate  that  his  mission  was  successful,  and  con- 
vinced the  authorities  as  to  what  should  be  their 
duty;  consequently  the  threatened  period  of  bloodshed 
was  averted,  and  the  bishop  returned  to  Louisiana  as  the 
bearer  of  the  messages  of  peace  and  good  will. 

"  In  his  religious  life,  while  the  bishop  was  strictly  loyal 
to  his  particular  creed,  yet  he  was  broad  and  sympathetic 
with  all  denominations  and  classes.  He  felt  the  import- 
ance of  individual  and  Church  discipline  and  order,  but 
he  recognised  and  respected  the  views  of  others. 

"  His  mission  in  life  seemed  to  be  to  uplift  the  stand- 
ard of  manhood,  and  at  the  same  time  encourage  peace 
and  good  will  among  all  men.  On  one  occasion,  when  he 
was  visiting  one  of  the  country  parishes  in  his  diocese, 
he  heard  that  there  was  danger  of  a  serious  trouble 
in  a  small  Roman  Catholic  church,  arising  between  the 
pastor  and  the  congregation.  He  immediately  sought 
the  first  opportunity  of  going  to  the  church  and  appear- 
ing before  the  congregation.  Not  wishing  to  violate  any 
of  the  rules  of  the  church,  he  did  not  go  into  the  chancel, 
but  stood  in  the  body  of  the  church  and  made  an  appeal 
to  the  congregation  on  behalf  of  their  religious  duty,  ir- 
respective of  individual  feelings.  He  said  in  substance 
as  follows:  'Owing  to  the  absence  of  your  own  bishop 
and  the  difficulty  of  his  getting  to  you  within  a  reasonable 
time,  I  have  taken  the  liberty  to  come  before  you  and 
appeal  to  you,  not  as  members  of  any  particular  sect, 
but  as  a  body  of  religious  people  who  owe  a  duty  to 
themselves,  to  their  bishop,  and  to  their  pastor.  I  am 
not  here  to  defend  your  pastor  or  to  defend  you.  The 
difficulties  between  you  and  him  are  not  for  me  to  con- 


JSisbop  Milmer  113 

sider;  but  I  do  appeal  to  you,  as  a  body  of  people  who 
gather  here  in  this  sacred  building  for  a  sacred  purpose, 
to  try  to  restrain  your  feelings,  and  control  your  im- 
pulses, and  subdue  your  prejudices.  Let  me  earnestly  re- 
quest of  you,  in  the  name  of  your  absent  bishop,  if  I  may 
be  permitted  to  do  so,  and  urge  upon  you  all,  pastor  and 
congregation,  a  united  effort  to  suspend  judgment  upon 
each  other,  and  to  try  and  live  harmoniously  together,  if 
not  permanently,  at  least  until  your  bishop  can  come  to 
you  and  hear  and  know  your  troubles.'  It  is  needless  to 
say  that  the  trouble  subsided  between  the  people  and  pas- 
tor, and  that  the  Bishop  of  Louisiana  evidenced  in  this  in- 
stance, as  in  many  others,  a  broadness,  a  generosity,  and 
a  courage  that  commended  him  to  all  those  who  knew 
him,  irrespective  of  faith  or  creed. 

"While  the  bishop  never  had  much  money,  yet  he 
was  always  only  too  glad  to  share  whatever  he  had  with 
others,  and  even  when  he  could  afford  larger  outlays  for 
himself,  yet  he  always  economised  in  everything  that  con- 
cerned his  own  personal  comfort. 

"  The  bishop  was  as  much  at  home  with  the  highest 
dignitaries  of  the  Church  or  State,  as  he  was  sitting  by 
the  bedside  of  a  poor,  suffering  fellow-creature  in  the 
humblest  home.  While  he  was  as  fond  of  a  joke,  and  as 
full  of  fun  as  any  one,  he  always  required  a  strict  observ- 
ance of  refinement  and  purity  of  thought,  and  could 
transform  a  weary,  gloomy  dinner  party  into  a  bright  and 
cheerful  gathering  by  some  of  his  witty  stories;  or  he 
could,  by  almost  a  single  wave  of  his  hand,  change  the 
tide  of  conversation  and  thought  from  what  was  low  or 
vicious,  to  what  might  be  helpful  or  uplifting.  A  friend 
tells  the  following  story,  as  illustrating  the  bishop's 


H4  JSfsbop  IGUlmer 

fondness  for  fun,  and  yet,  at  the  same  time,  abhorrence  of 
anything  that  partook  of  vulgarity.  On  one  occasion, 
in  New  York,  at  a  large  dinner  at  which  the  bishop  was 
present,  after  the  ladies  had  left  the  room,  and  the 
bishop  and  others  had  been  reciting  some  amusing  ex- 
periences, one  gentleman  suggested  that  as  there  were  no 
ladies  present,  he  had  an  experience  to  relate,  where- 
upon the  bishop  with  great  politeness,  but  with  equal 
dignity,  requested  that  if  it  were  a  story  that  required 
the  absence  of  ladies,  he  would  be  much  obliged  if  the 
gentleman  would  consider  him  (the  bishop)  '  a  lady ' 
for  the  purpose  of  the  occasion. 

"This  suggestion  by  the  bishop  was  done  so  grace- 
fully, and  yet  so  quickly,  that  there  was  no  interruption 
to  the  continuance  of  the  pleasant  gathering;  and  in  fact, 
it  was  even  more  pleasant,  for  the  reason  that  the  bishop 
had  fixed  a  standard  of  refinement  for  the  wit  and  humour 
that  stimulated  every  one  present  to  their  best  efforts. 

"While  Bishop  Wilmer  had  the  gentleness  of  a  dove, 
yet  he  had  a  '  lion's  heart '  and  an  '  eagle's  eye.'  If  he 
ever  had  any  uncontrollable  fear  of  danger,  he  never 
showed  it,  and  his  only  struggle  seemed  to  be  at  times  to 
avoid  courting  danger  or  being  tempted  into  martyrdom 
which  might  seem  ostentatious.  Whenever  there  was  a 
disagreeable  duty  to  perform,  or  any  matter  came  under 
consideration  that  made  it  seem  disagreeable  for  an  indi- 
vidual to  act  or  assume  a  responsibility  that  might  be 
dangerous,  this  rather  remarkable  man,  either  when  a 
college  boy  or  as  the  Bishop  of  Louisiana,  was  ever  ready 
to  act  alone,  or  as  follower,  or  leader.  He  never  faltered 
in  the  face  of  danger,  except  to  avoid  being  unduly  con- 
spicuous. He  often  said  that  martyrdom  was  so  glori- 
ous that  it  was  usually  too  great  a  temptation  for  some 


Bisbop  TKHilmer  115 

natures.  On  one  occasion,  when  there  was  under  dis- 
cussion some  action  that  involved  a  great  deal  of  glory, 
as  well  as  of  risk,  the  bishop  turned  to  those  around  him 
and  spoke  substantially  as  follows  :  '  Before  we  can  de- 
cide our  full  duty  in  this  matter  we  must  eliminate  as  far 
as  possible  that  glorious  picture  of  martyrdom  which 
may  too  often  encourage  us  to  deeds  of  heroism  some- 
times so  selfish  in  their  purpose.'  Thus  he  discouraged 
useless  effort,  which,  while  it  might  have  invited  great 
public  applause  temporarily,  yet  was  prompted  almost 
wholly  by  a  somewhat  morbid  desire  for  notoriety.  The 
bishop  aptly  said,  '  It  is  often  a  greater  temptation  to  be 
a  martyr,  than  to  avoid  the  danger  that  might  involve 
martyrdom.'  Thus  through  his  whole  life  there  were 
evidences  of  a  fearlessness  which  had  been  developed 
through  a  moral  self-denial;  and  he  proved,  as  few  men 
prove,  that  the  highest  form  of  courage  is  that  which  re- 
sults, not  from  an  entire  ignorance  of  fear,  but  from  that 
control  of  fear  which  comes  from  training  in  methods  of 
self-control.  He  knew  no  fear,  not  because  he  had  never 
felt  fear  or  because  he  had  not  passed  through  the 
timidity  of  childhood,  but  because,  by  reason  of  his 
purity  and  innocency  of  life,  he  had  developed  a  con- 
science which  could  have  no  accuser. 

'"A  guilty  conscience  needs  no  accuser,'  for  its  guilt 
is  traceable  to  the  conduct  of  its  possessor,  but  a  guiltless 
conscience  comes  from  a  purity  and  innocency  of  life 
that  has  shut  out  evil,  and  is  consequently  fearless  of 
danger.  Thus  Bishop  Wilmer's  life  exemplified  what 
only  such  lives  can  exemplify,  for  he  trained  his  life,  his 
thoughts,  and  his  feelings  so  that  they  were  controlled 
alone  by  the  highest  motives  and  purposes. 


n6  JStsbop  TKIlf  inter 

Bishop  Wilmer  was  a  man  of  wide  experience  and  close 
observation.  While  he  was  as  pure-minded  and  innocent 
as  a  child,  having  carefully  abstained  from  suspicious 
and  cynical  thoughts,  as  well  as  harmful  associations,  yet 
he  thoroughly  understood  human  nature,  and  was  ever 
ready  to  meet  any  type  of  man;  but  he  always  used  such 
an  opportunity  to  try  and  direct  the  thoughts  of  his 
hearers  and  associates  on  lines  that  might  be  uplifting 
and  helpful.  He  was  ready  alike  to  welcome  the  most 
guilty  culprit  or  the  most  distinguished  citizen,  when- 
ever he  felt  that  such  meeting  might  be  productive  of 
good;  and  he  so  trained  himself  to  self-control  by  such 
high  lines  of  thought  that  he  was  ever  ready  to  know 
how  to  act  in  any  emergency.  He  was  naturally  most 
cordial  and  genial  in  manner,  yet  he  had  that  power  of 
discrimination  which  fitted  him  to  meet  all  men  on  the 
best  terms. 

"  On  one  occasion,  when  visiting  his  son  who  was  at  a 
Northern  college,  they  met  a  prominent  man  whom  the 
son  introduced  to  his  father.  As  this  gentleman  had 
been  very  kind  to  young  Wilmer,  the  young  man  was  very 
cordial  in  his  manner,  and  was  somewhat  disappointed 
and  surprised  to  find  that  his  father,  the  bishop,  was 
rather  cold  and  reserved.  After  the  introduction,  when 
the  interview  had  closed,  young  Wilmer  turned  to  his 
father  and  expressed  great  regret  that  the  bishop  had 
been  somewhat  undemonstrative  and  reserved,  where- 
upon the  bishop  replied,  '  Oh,  my  dear  boy,  when  you 
are  a  little  older,  you  will  understand  that  the  kindest 
hearts  and  the  most  cordial  feelings  are  often  hidden  by 
a  rather  cold  exterior.  The  gentleman  who  has  been  so 
kind  to  you,  and  whose  kindness  I  deeply  appreciate, 
does  not  belong  to  that  class  of  men  who  at  first  under- 


Bisbop  Milmer  117 

stand  demonstrativeness,  or  interpret  it  as  you  and  1 
might  wish.  If  I  had  treated  him  as  I  was  inclined  to 
do,  it  would  have  been  unwelcome  to  him.  He  belongs 
to  that  class  of  people  whose  splendid  natures  have  been 
reared  up  under  influences  that  discourage  all  outward 
manifestations  of  feeling;  and  yet  who  may  feel  as 
deeply  and  sincerely  as  those  of  us  who  have  been 
brought  up  in  a  different  atmosphere.  I  appreciate,  my 
dear  boy,  your  desire  that  I  should  amply  show  my  grate- 
ful feelings;  but  your  friend,  whom  I  now  hope  is  my 
friend,  understood  more  from  my  eye  and  the  grasp  of 
my  hand,  than  he  would  have  done  from  the  most  cor- 
dial or  effusive  expressions  of  gratitude.  As  you  grow 
older,  you  will  realise  that  human  nature,  while  in  the 
main  it  is  alike  in  all  people,  yet,  in  different  individuals, 
requires  widely  different  treatment;  and  it  may  be  a  part 
of  your  study  and  experience  in  your  college  life,  as 
well  as  hereafter,  to  learn  how  to  discriminate  between 
individuals.' 

"  Within  a  short  time  afterwards,  young  Wilmer  met 
this  aforesaid  gentleman.  He  came  up,  and  with  sur- 
prising cordiality,  spoke  with  unusual  delight  of  the  way 
in  which  the  bishop  had  greeted  him,  and  intimated  his 
desire  to  see  him  again.  It  is  needless  to  say  that,  as 
supplementing  this  impression,  this  same  gentleman  was 
ever  afterward  more  kind  and  attentive  to  this  college 
boy  than  ever  before." 

It  would  be  impossible  but  that  such  inci- 
dents as  a  near  kinsman  has  here  recorded 
should  have  circulated  in  various  forms  and 
with  slight  differences.  As  a  rule,  of  course,  a 

o 

son's  recollections  of  his  father  must  take  fore- 


us  JStsbop  TKIUlmer 

most  rank  over  any  other  recollections.  But 
I  am  bound  to  say  that,  as  I  have  originally 
heard  it  related,  the  bishop's  visit  to  a  Roman 
congregation,  upon  whom  he  urged  patience 
and  forbearance  in  a  parish  quarrel,  was  fol- 
lowed by  a  visit  which  he  made  to  the  pastor, 
who,  it  seems,  had  become  intemperate.  To 
him  the  bishop  is  said  to  have  spoken  with 
equal  tenderness,  wisdom,  and  fidelity.  He 
disclaimed  authority  whether  to  reprove,  re- 
buke, or  exhort ;  but  he  plead,  as  one  man  with 
another,  and  crowned  his  plea  with  prayer.  It 
is  said  that  that  pastor  made  it  a  turning-point 
in  his  life. 

Two  addresses  to  his  Diocesan  Convention, 
delivered  by  Bishop  Wilmer,  respectively  in 
1867  and  1868,  have  come  into  my  hands. 
They  help  to  complete  this  superficial  por- 
traiture of  a  personality  of  rare  gifts  and 
powers.  The  first  of  them  closes  with  a  dis- 
cussion of  the  Race  question  in  the  South, 
which,  though  the  words  were  uttered  nearly 
forty  years  ago,  is  as  true  and  as  pertinent  to- 
day as  when  the  address  was  delivered.  Bishop 
Wilmer,  though  born  in  New  Jersey,  was  no 
Northern  radical.  He  believed  in  the  institu- 
tion of  slavery,  while  it  existed,  and  made  no 
pretence  of  satisfaction  when  it  was  abolished. 


JBisbop  Wilmer  ng 

But,  with  the  vision  of  a  seer,  he  recognised, 
when  the  Civil  War  was  ended,  the  new  duties 
that  had  come  to  the  South  ;  and  in  the  address 
to  which  I  have  referred  he  pressed  them  home 
upon  the  Church  people  of  Louisiana  with 
rare  eloquence,  and  with  a  splendid  courage. 

They  are  the  same  qualities  which  reveal 
themselves  in  his  address  of  the  following  year. 
It  was  the  year  of  the  first  Lambeth  Con- 
ference, a  gathering  projected  amid  many 
doubts,  and  feeling  its  way  with  somewhat 
uncertain  steps.  But,  however  meagre  its 
discussions  or  modest  its  output  of  declarations, 
Bishop  Wilmer  saw  in  it  the  dawn  of  a  great 
purpose,  and  the  promise  of  vast  potentialities. 
That  impressive  movement  toward  Christian 
Unity  which  in  the  Lambeth  Conference 
found  its  cradle,  he  recognised  in  its  feeblest 
beginnings.  With  the  larger  discernment  of  a 
statesman  he  perceived  "  whereunto  it  might 
grow,"  and  of  what  he  saw,  with  characteristic 
eloquence,  he  spoke. 

"The  world  affects"  he  said,  "to  sneer  at  Church 
councils  as  vain  and  useless.  We  have  the  authority  of 
a  great  historian1  for  saying  that  the  world  is  indebted  to 
the  Council  of  Nice  for  the  first  idea  of  a  true  repre- 
sentative assembly.  The  fact  stands  confessed  that 
1  Alison,  in  his  preface  to  the  History  of  Europe, 


120  JSisbop  Milmer 

nations  have  been  taught  how  to  rule  and  legislate  for 
their  subjects,  by  the  example  of  the  Church.  A  few 
years  ago  our  American  branch  of  the  Church  assembled 
in  General  Convention  at  the  close  of  the  war,  to  legislate 
for  healing  its  wounds,  and  recovering  the  broken  ties  of 
ecclesiastical  unity.  In  one  day  that  task  was  completed. 
I  am  bold  to  say  that  if  the  civil  power  had  been  wise 
enough  to  work  after  that  model,  the  peace  of  the  Church 
would  have  been  the  peace  of  the  Nation." 

"  This  lesson  is  not  yet  completed,"  adds 
Bishop  Wilmer.  Nor  is  it,  even  now,  we  may 
frankly  own.  But  as  we  do  so,  we  must  needs 
pay  homage  to  the  memory  of  one  who,  with 
inspired  vision,  beheld  the  day-dawn  from  afar  ! 


Bishop  Clarfeson 


VIII 

Bisbop  Clarfcson 

THE    RIGHT    REVEREND  DR.    ROBERT    HARPER 

CLARKSON,    MISSIONARY    BISHOP    OF 

NEBRASKA 

THERE  is  a  distinction  in  the  nomencla- 
ture obtaining  in  the  American  House  of 
Bishops  which  does  not  always  seem  quite  real 
or  accurately  descriptive.  The  bishops  of  what 
are  known  as  "  organised  dioceses  "  are  desig- 
nated, absolutely,  as  bishops,  and  have  no 
canonical  responsibility  (save  that  to  the 
General  Convention,  as  the  law-making  body 
for  the  whole  Church)  other  than  that  to  their 
own  diocese.  The  diocese  elects  them,  assumes 
the  burden  of  their  maintenance ;  and,  as 
organised  under  canonical  provisions  of  the 
General  Convention,  sits  and  votes,  in  the 
persons  of  its  representatives,  in  both  Houses 
of  that  body. 

A  "missionary  bishop,"  on  the  other  hand, 
is  a  bishop  chosen  by  the  General  Convention, 

123 


124  JSisbop  Clarfeson 

the  House  of  Bishops  nominating  him,  and  the 
House  of  (clerical  and  lay)  Deputies  electing 
him — the  two  Houses  voting  separately, — and 
is  maintained  by  the  Board  of  Missions.  He 
has  jurisdiction,  usually,  in  one  or  more  terri- 
tories, or  in  some  part  of  a  territory,  usually 
but  sparsely  and  newly  settled,  and  where  the 
characteristics  of  frontier  life — for  usually  it  is 
frontier  life — are  rude  and  primitive.  As  a 
matter  of  fact,  however,  the  lot  of  a  diocesan 
bishop  is  often  quite  as  austere  and  laborious. 
It  was  to  a  missionary  jurisdiction,  including, 
then,  the  whole  of  the  territory  of  Nebraska, 
that  there  was  called,  in  1865,  the  Rev.  Dr. 
Robert  Harper  Clarkson,  at  that  time  rector 
of  St.  James's  Church,  Chicago ;  and  no 
episcopate  in  the  American  Church  affords  a 
nobler  illustration  of  the  highest  ideal  of  a 
missionary  bishop  than  did  his.  Dr.  Clarkson 
was  born,  in  1826,  at  Gettysburg,  Penn.,  of 
churchly  lineage  ;  and  those  two  facts  were 
singularly  typical  of  much  that  was  most  dis- 
tinctive in  his  character.  His  grandfather,  the 
Rev.  Dr.  Joseph  Clarkson,  was  the  first 
clergyman  ordained  by  Bishop  White ;  and 
Robert  Clarkson  grew  up  among  traditions 
which  were  eminently  conservative  and  retro- 
spective in  their  character.  But  when  he  went 


th<    f  louse  o]  T'.'  '*t<ni;  him,  and  the 

MoiKc   of  (i  1  •  '  *• pities  electing 

him— -li^  '>-'i<i/  st'parately, — and 

ha^  ir.r<->  \.  in  one  or  more  terri- 

tori<--  --^it  of  a  territory,  usually 

*»y  settled,  and  whrrc  the 
chara«  ••  »tier  life — for  usually  u  is 

front"  !->'1e  and   primitive.     As   a 

mat  •  vor,  the  lot  of  a  diocesan 

bis  i>  austere  and  laborious. 

jurisdiction,  including, 
The  Right  Reverend        '-braska, 
Doctor  Robert  Harper  Clarksoa, 
Missionary  Bishop  of  Nebraska,    rector 

From  a  photograph  by  Notman  &  Campbell,  Boston.'       fjQ 

Church   affords  a 
the   highest    ^i*rai   of   a 
tsan  did  his.      Dr.  Clarkson 
at  Gettysburg,    Penn.,    of 
and   thos'    two  facts  were 
of  much  thit  was  most  dis- 
^rai)dfather,  the 
-  .is    the    first 
•V  hite  ;    and 
*\-^   traditions 
and  retro- 
\vhen  he  went 


JBisbop  Clacfeson  125 

to  Chicago,  as  a  young  priest,  he  must  have 
learned,  if  never  before,  why  he  had  been  born 
in  Gettysburg,  and  why  life  in  the  Church,  like 
life  in  the  Republic,  could  not  be  merely  a  re- 
affirmation  of  traditions  in  which  his  ancestors 
had  been  nurtured. 

In  other  words,  he  must  early  have  learned — 
what  so  nobly  his  episcopate  illustrated — that 
the  work  of  the  Church,  and,  incidentally,  of  a 
bishop  as  a  workman  in  it,  did  not,  and  could 
not,  consist  in  merely  reproducing  those 
eminently  respectable  and  decorous  conventions 
in  which,  at  the  beginning  of  the  life  of  our 
Republic,  the  life  of  the  Church  largely  con- 
sisted. Young  Clarkson  went,  upon  his  ordina- 
tion, to  Chicago,  and  became  (in  1849)  rector 
of  St.  James's  Church,  there.  The  great  city 
which  the  more  modern  traveller  knows  was 
then  in  its  formless  beginnings  ;  and  its  crude 
construction,  and  especially  its  unwholesome 
system  of  drainage, — if  anything  of  that  sort 
could,  then,  have  been  said  to  exist, — made  it  a 
prolific  home  for  the  awful  scourge  of  cholera 
which,  almost  before  the  young  deacon, 
Clarkson,  was  settled  in  his  new  home,  began 
its  appalling  ravages.  These  spared  no  class 
or  neighbourhood ;  and,  alas,  too  often  the 
ministers  of  religion,  with  others,  fled  before 


i26  Bisbop  Clarfeson 

it.     But  while  others  ran  away,  Clarkson  never 
flinched. 

"  Day  and  night,"  as  a  Western  newspaper  put  it,  "  the 
young  deacon  held  his  way  among  the  stricken  ;  nursing 
the  sick,  helping  the  poor,  cheering  the  hearts  of  the 
bereaved,  holding  the  cross  before  the  dying,  and  bury- 
ing the  forsaken  dead.  Stricken  down,  himself,  he 
conquered  the  disease  by  his  indomitable  spirit  ;  and 
weak  and  weary  as  he  was,  went  out,  again,  to  the  utter 
misery  all  around  him,  never  stopping  to  rest ;  never 
heeding  the  cries  of  fear."  ' 

It  can  be  easily  imagined  what  a  place  such 
service  won  for  him  in  the  hearts  of  his  fellow- 
citizens  ;  and  how,  as  his  work,  and  he  himself, 
grew,  in  Chicago,  his  hold  upon  men  of  every 
class  became  stronger  and  more  potential. 
Indeed,  it  would  not  have  been  surprising  if, 
when  he  was  elected  a  missionary  bishop,  he 
had  returned  answer  that  his  duty  was  to  stay 
in  the  city  where  he  had  begun  his  ministry, 
and  where  every  problem  that  can  challenge  a 
minister  of  Christ  was  becoming  so  grave  and 
so  imperious.  Other  communities  in  the 
Republic,  no  matter  how  largely  recruited 
from  abroad,  have  seemed  to  inherit,  and  to 
have  retained,  some  of  those  conservative  ele- 
ments which  have  helped  to  maintain,  and  con- 
tinue in  healthful  efficacy,  earlier  standards  of 

1  Omaha  Herald,  March  II,  1884. 


Bisbop  Clarfeson  127 

dignity  and  order.  New  York,  for  instance, 
polyglot  as  it  is,  and  vast  as  are  the  hordes  of 
aliens  that  have  continued  to  pour  into  it,  has 
not  yet  lost — Heaven  grant  that  it  may  never 
lose  ! — the  potent  spell  of  those  earlier  Dutch 
traditions  which,  from  the  beginning  of  its 
civic  life,  have  been  such  efficient  forces  on 
the  side  of  civic  order  and  righteousness.  But 
Chicago,  whatever  estimable  qualities  may 
have  distinguished  its  New  England  founders, 
speedily  passed  into  the  hands  of  elements  so 
mixed,  and,  in  many  characteristics,  so  revolu- 
tionary, that  no  civic  upheaval  occurring  there, 
whether  at  the  polls,  or  in  the  streets,  has 
greatly  surprised  men. 

To  such  a  community  it  is  not  difficult  to 
imagine  what  such  a  man  as  Dr.  Robert 
Clarkson  might  have  been  ;  and  to  leave  it  for 
the  work  of  a  frontiersman  in  Nebraska  must 
needs  have  seemed,  to  many  dispassionate 
minds,  a  very  doubtful  duty. 

But  it  did  not  seem  so  to  Dr.  Clarkson. 
Personally,  he  had  every  inducement  to  decline 
the  call  of  the  General  Convention  to  Nebraska. 
The  town  to  which  he  had  gone  as  a  young 
deacon  had  grown  to  the  proportions  of  a 
wealthy  and  populous  community;  and  the 
little  wooden  edifice  in  which,  originally,  he 


128  JSisbop  Clarfcson 

had  ministered,  had  given  place  to  a  stately 
and  beautiful  stone  structure,  distinguished  in 
all  its  appointments  by  cost  and  splendour. 
Better  than  all  this,  Dr.  Clarkson's  influence 
had  grown  with  his  own  years,  and  with  the 
intelligent  appreciation  of  the  character  of  his 
ministry ;  and  few  men  have  ever  lived  in 
Chicago  who  have  touched  with  a  hand  so 
sympathetic  and  inspiring  the  lives  of  men,  and 
especially  of  young  men.  What  was  there  in 
Nebraska  to  compare  with  a  centre  of  such  in- 
fluence and  power  ?  There  is  abundant  evidence 
that  questions  such  as  this  were  pressed  home 
upon  him,  when  the  call  to  Nebraska  came  to 
him  ;  but  he  did  not  refuse  it.  It  had  come  to 
him  from  the  whole  Church,  by  the  voice  of  its 
General  Convention  ;  and  though,  as  Bishop 
Hare  says,  in  his  memorial  sermon,  "  the 
announcement  [of  his  election]  drove  the  blood 
from  his  cheeks  and  left  him  speechless  for 
moments,"  he  could  not  disown  its  authority. 
In  a  sermon  preached  to  his  people  in  St. 
James's  Church,  Chicago,  announcing  his  de- 
cision, he  used  these  words  : 

"  Entirely  unexpected,  without  the  slightest  desire  on 
my  part,  and  with  scarcely  the  shadow  of  training,  the 
announcement  of  the  Church  came  upon  me.  The  very 
thought  of  the  necessary  severing  of  ties,  and  disturbing 


ffitsbop  Glarfeson  129 

of  the  associations  of  seventeen  years  of  a  happy  pas- 
torate, was  more  than  I  could  bear.  And  whilst  I  was 
enduring  anguish  and  agitation  in  the  balancing  of  inclin- 
ation with  duty,  such  as  I  pray  God  I  may  never  again 
experience,  I  went  to  one  of  the  bishops,  and  told  him 
that  I  could  not  and  would  not  go,  and  laid  before  him 
the  reasons  for  my  decision, — ultimate  as  I  then  thought 
it.  When  I  told  him  of  my  ministry  here,  commenced 
in  the  fervour  and  enthusiasm  of  youth,  and  deep-rooted 
in  the  spiritual  services  and  pastoral  experiences  of  so 
many  years, — of  my  flock  united  in  a  most  remarkable 
degree,  and  precious  to  me,  every  one,  without  an 
exception,  and  of  my  delightful  home,  filled  with  num- 
berless testimonials  of  your  attachment, — and  of  my 
beautiful  church,  every  stone  of  which  was  cemented  by 
my  anxieties  and  my  prayers, — and  of  the  city  with 
which  I  had  grown  up,  the  only  dwelling  place  of  my 
manhood's  years,  the  birthplace  of  my  children,  and  the 
sleeping  ground  of  my  dead — I  supposed  that  this  was 
enough  to  satisfy  any  reasonable  man  that  I  ought  not 
to  be  asked  to  go.  His  only  reply,  as  he  laid  his  hand 
upon  my  shoulder,  and  looked  me  calmly  in  the  eye, 
was:  'Your  Master  in  heaven  left  infinitely  more  than 
this  for  you.  Life  is  short.  The  account  you  must  give 
will  be  strict.  Go  where  He  has  sent  you.'  What  could 
I  say  ?  Shame  and  silence  sealed  my  lips.  From 
that  hour  the  more  I  thought  over  the  matter,  and  the 
more  I  prayed  over  it,  and  the  more  I  discussed  it  with 
holy  men,  who  believe  that  there  is  a  God,  and  that 
there  are  such  things  as  duty,  accountability,  necessary 
self-surrender,  and  the  baptism  of  the  Holy  Ghost,  the 
clearer  grew  the  whole  subject,  the  more  insignificant 
and  sinful  seemed  the  thought  of  the  personal  sacrifice 


130  JSisbop  Clarfeson 

involved,  and  the  more  imperative  became  the  demand 
of  conscience;  and,  although  I  reserved  the  right  of  final 
decision  until  I  came  home,  and  did  not  definitely  de- 
termine until  since  my  return,  yet  every  day  has  settled 
me  firmer  in  the  conviction  best  expressed  in  the  lines 
of  the  text,  '  What  am  I  that  I  could  withstand  God  ? ' '' 

It  was  with  such  a  conception  of  his  duty 
that  Bishop  Clarkson  turned  his  back  upon  his 
great  city  parish,  and  went  forth  to  the  wilder- 
ness and  its  privations.  Men — and  things- 
move  so  fast  in  America  that,  already,  it  is  not 
easy  to  realise  what  a  Western  territory  was  in 
the  year  1865.  Nebraska  is  already  a  great, 
state,  gridironed  with  railways  and  dotted, 
from  end  to  end,  with  thriving  towns.  Then 
it  was  a  wilderness  with,  here  and  there,  a 
settlement  of  log-cabins,  or  of  clap-board 
houses,  poor,  perishable,  and,  often,  pathet- 
ically significant.  For,  whether  the  Nebraskan 
settler  came  from  New  England,  New  York, 
or  beyond  seas,  he  came,  ordinarily,  under 
stern  compulsion,  with  narrow  means,  and 
meagre  outfit,  and  only  an  equipment  of  the 
'*  larger  hope." 

Indeed,  it  is  one  of  the  painful  conditions  of 
a  missionary  episcopate  in  the  United  States 
that  it  is,  so  often,  a  service  where  the  bond- 
man is  called  upon,  like  the  Hebrew  slaves  in 


Bisbop  Glarfeson  i3i 

Egypt,  to  "  make  bricks  without  straw."  A 
missionary  field  in  which  the  objects  of  the 
Church's  care  are  savages  has,  at  any  rate,  this 
advantage,  that  they  to  whom  the  missionary 
is  sent  have  no  impossible  expectations  in 
regard  to  himself,  or  his  chapel.  If  the  one 
be  the  least  cultivated  of  men,  and  the  other 
the  simplest  of  structures,  both  are  far  in 
advance  of  anything  of  either  sort  that  the 
savage  has  known.  But  a  missionary  bishop 
in  our  far  West  has  often  ministered  to  people 
of  inherited  refinement,  and  of  liberal  culture. 
If  one  had  time  to  listen  to  their  ancestral 
traditions,  these  were  found,  often,  to  run  back 
to  refined  homes,  and  stately  sanctuaries,  and 
scholarly  ministries,  far  away  ;  the  memories  of 
which  were  but  a  poor  preparation  for  the 
privations  of  the  life  of  a  backwoodsman. 
And  so  it  came  to  pass  that  the  bishop  had, 
often,  to  listen  to  the  complaints  of  a  flock  who 
forgot — to  use  a  vulgar  proverb — that  "one 
cannot  secure  all  the  moral  virtues  for  t 
shilling  a  day" — or,  in  other  words,  that  a 
Western  missionary,  barely  keeping  body  and 
soul  together  on  a  stipend  that  did  not  often 
reach  a  thousand  dollars  a  year,  could  not  be 
expected  to  illustrate  the  wide  culture  and 
intellectual  superiority  that  were  within  the 


132  £i9bop  Clarfcson 

reach,  alone,  of  men  of  more  scholarly  oppor- 
tunities and  ampler  resources.  "  Our  minister 
is  so  dull,  so  crude,  so  unlettered,  so  poorly 
endowed ! "  complained  these  rural  congrega- 
tions to  the  bishop.  And  the  bishop,  instead 
of  resenting  these  utterly  unreasonable  de- 
mands as  they  deserved,  would  simply  reply, 
"  Oh,  well ;  next  time  I  will  send  you  the 
Archbishop  of  Canterbury  ! " 

It  was  this  inexhaustible  and  exuberant 
cheerfulness  and  good  temper  that  was  no 
small  element  of  the  power  of  Bishop  Clarkson. 
"  He  was,  as  a  boy,"  says  Bishop  Hare,  in  the 
memorial  sermon  to  which  I  have  already  re- 
ferred, "just  what  those  of  us  who  knew  him 
only  as  a  man,  would  have  inferred, — full  of 
life  and  spirits  ;  susceptible  to  every  impression 
from  without ;  endowed  with  a  keen  sense  of 
the  ludicrous  ;  and  hungry  for  all  sorts  of  fun." 
Happy  gift,  that,  all  the  way  through,  kept  his 
heart  young,  and  made  life  for  him  a  less 
sombre  and  irksome  thing,  because,  so  often, 
he  could  transfix  its  most  vexatious  experi- 
ences with  the  Ithuriel  spear  of  humour! 
Said  the  late  Dr.  Clinton  Locke,  at  that  time 
rector  of  Grace  Church,  Chicago,  speaking  at  a 
memorial  service  held  in  St.  James's  Church, 
Chicago,  after  the  bishop's  death,  of  the 


JSisbop  Glarfeson  133 

visits  that  Bishop  Clarkson  was  wont  to  make 
to  him  : 

"  He  never  complained  of  anything  that  he  had  to 
endure ;  and,  with  that  brightness  which  was  so 
characteristic  of  him,  turned  every  discomfort  into  a 
source  of  amusement  ;  but  he  could  tell  a  story  of  trials 
and  perils,  by  land  and  water,  by  flood  and  tempest,  by 
heat  and  cold,  during  the  early  years  of  his  episcopate  in 
Nebraska  and  Dakota,  which  would  shock  the  nerves  of 
many  a  man  who  thinks  himself  hardly  used  if  he  has 
to  pass  one  night  away  from  all  the  appliances  of  modern 
civilisation." 

And  yet,  such  elements  in  his  work  he  threw 
aside  with  the  utter  disregard  of  features  of 
hardship  which  was  invariably  characteristic 
of  him.  He  had  but  just  entered  the  House  of 
Bishops  when  I  first  knew  him ;  but  though  I 
then  observed  him  with  all  the  intense  admira- 
tion of  youth  for  his  ripe  heroism  ;  and  though, 
not  then  a  bishop  myself,  I  listened  with  eager 
respect  and  enthusiasm  for  his  stories  of  his 
work  and  his  office,  I  never  heard  him  utter 
even  in  any  of  the  most  confidential  discussions 
in  that  House,  one  word  of  recital  which  in 
anywise  implied  the  note  of  hardship  or  priva- 
tion in  his  experiences  ;  though  from  others  I 
learned  how  much  there  was  of  both.  His 
characteristics  in  the  House  of  Bishops  were 
those  of  great  mental  alertness,  modesty,  and 


i34  JSisbop  Clarhson 

invariable  and  universal  kindliness.  There 
were  men  sitting  beside  him  in  that  body  from 
whom  his  own  ecclesiastical  training — and 
theirs — made  him,  inevitably,  far  removed. 
But  no  one  would  have  ever  discovered  such  a 
fact  in  anything  in  his  speech  or  bearing.  He 
understood  with  a  fine  discernment  his  own 
intellectual  limitations  ;  and  did  not  commit  the 
blunder  which  is,  so  often,  the  blunder  of  the 
theologian,  of  mistaking  intellectual  limitations 
in  others  for  moral  obliquity. 

A  great  bishop,  referring  to  the  episcopate 
of  another  whose  administration  of  his  diocese 
had  singularly  failed  to  fulfil  the  anticipations 
which  had  been  formed  of  it,  said  that  similar 
failures  had  led  him  to  apprehend  that  a  very 
successful  parish  priest  would  rarely  make  an 
efficient  bishop ;  and,  when  asked  to  explain 
so  occult  an  observation,  answered  that  a  very 
successful  parish  priest  was,  ordinarily,  an  ab- 
solutist ;  that  the  government  of  his  parish 
was,  usually,  a  paternal  government ;  and  that 
the  principle  of  a  paternal,  as  distinguished 
from  a  constitutional,  government  was  that  it 
was  "  rule  without  reasons,"  —  the  exercise  of 
authority  without  the  elements  of  conference 
and  consultation  ;  and  that  while,  for  obvious 
reasons,  it  was  possible  to  govern  a  parish  in 


Bisbop  Glarftson  135 

that  way,  it  was  a  fatal  blunder  to  attempt 
so  to  administer  a  diocese. 

Obviously  :  for  a  diocese  is  ordinarily  made 
up  of  men  many  of  whom  regard  themselves 
as,  in  mental  endowments  and  ecclesiastical 
experience,  quite  the  peer  of  their  bishop  ; 
while  with  all  of  them  there  is  a  keen  sensi- 
tiveness to  constitutional  rights  and  dignities, 
which  makes  them  swift  to  resent,  in  the 
Ordinary,  any  even  apparent  disregard  of 
them.  In  these  respects  Bishop  Clarkson's 
administration  was  ideal.  He  was  undoubt- 
edly much  more  than  the  peer  of  the  great 
majority  of  his  clergy.  But  he  never  forgot 
that  magnificent  law  of  episcopal  service 
which,  the  Rev.  Dr.  Samuel  Hart  tells  us, 
in  his  noble  sermon,  memorial  of  the  fourth 
bishop  of  Connecticut,  Bishop  Williams,  when 
he  began  his  journal  as  bishop,  wrote  at  the 
head  of  it  :  "  If  thou  be  made  the  master,  lift 
not  thyself  up,  but  be  among  them  as  one  of 
the  rest."  Bishop  Clarkson  never  forgot 
that  rule  ;  and,  because  he  worked  with,  as 
well  as  for,  his  clergy  and  his  diocese  (as  it 
speedily  came  to  be),  the  Church  in  Nebraska 
grew  from  its  feeble  beginnings  into  a  noble 
ripeness  and  maturity. 

I   may  well  conclude  these  recollections  of 

1  Ecclestasticus  xxxii.,  i. 


136  JBtsbop  Clarfeson 

Bishop  Clarkson  by  a  tribute  to  his  memory 
paid  by  a  citizen  of  Nebraska  at  a  meeting  of 
the  citizens  of  Omaha,  held  in  Boyd's  Opera 
House  on  the  evening  of  the  i2th  of  March, 
1884.  This  meeting  was  the  more  remarkable 
in  that  it  included,  in  those  who  took  part  in 
it,  people  of  all  nationalities  and  walks  in  life, 
and  of  all  communions.  It  was  a  citizens' 
meeting,  to  honour  one  who  had  never  for- 
gotten the  duties  of  his  office,  but  had  made 
that  office  larger  and  more  potential  than 
its  merely  ecclesiastical  traditions.  Mr.  Pop- 
pleton *  spoke  as  follows  : 

"  Bishop  Clarkson  first  visited  Omaha  in  December, 
1865,  and  shortly  after  became  a  permanent  resident. 
At  that  time  Omaha  had  just  become  fully  aroused  from 
the  lethargy  which  had  settled  upon  it  in  September, 
1857,  and  seemed  girding  itself  for  the  growth  and  pros- 
perity which  these  latter  years  have  witnessed.  The 
territory  was  slowly  recovering  from  a  prolonged  stagna- 
tion in  immigration  and  development,  which  had  driven 
many  from  its  borders,  and  discouraged  and  disheart- 
ened those  at  home.  There  were  less  than  fifty  miles  of 
railway  in  Nebraska.  The  extension  of  that  was  doubt- 
ful and  uncertain.  Many  of  the  great  railway  systems 
which  have  during  his  residence  among  us  gradually 
extended  themselves  west  of  the  Missouri  until  their 
mileage  is  reckoned  by  thousands,  and  no  federal  terri- 
tory is  left  untouched,  were  unorganised  and  unknown. 

1  The  Hon.  A.  J.  Poppleton. 


JSisbop  Clarftson  137 

"  The  vast  territory  constituting  his  missionary  juris- 
diction was  rich  in  nothing  but  natural  resources,  and  in 
the  hearts  and  arms  of  widely  scattered  settlements,  led 
largely  by  men  under  forty  years  of  age,  who  had  by 
accident  or  impulse  effected  a  lodgment  in  that  particu- 
lar spot,  and  with  their  homes  and  altars  were  there  to 
stay.  To  the  vision  of  those  who  for  years  had  waited 
for  the  dawn,  the  future  seemed  as  gloomy  as  the  past ; 
and  they  looked  forward  rather  with  anxiety  than  hope. 

"  Coming  to  the  territory  at  such  a  time,  Bishop 
Clarkson  made  an  enormous  contribution  to  the  hope 
and  confidence  of  the  people.  Victor  Hugo  says  of  one 
of  his  ideal  heroes,  '  He  was  one,  but  he  was  equal  to 
ten  thousand  ! '  With  a  quick,  keen  sympathy  which 
seemed  to  touch  every  phase  of  life,  he  identified  himself 
in  feeling  and  act  with  all  worthy  plans  for  material 
growth  and  progress.  With  a  never  flagging  hope,  in- 
spired, perhaps,  to  some  extent  by  the  marvellous  progress 
of  the  city  from  which  he  came,  and  a  clear  vision  of  the 
latent  possibilities  of  the  empire  through  which  his 
journeyings  led,  he  was  a  living  force  in  the  advance- 
ment of  every  enterprise. 

"  Some  of  us,  too,  remember  that  when  any  long- 
watched  work  had  been  crowned  with  success,  and  we 
gathered  together  fitly  to  celebrate  its  completion,  he 
was  often  present,  one  of  the  chief  contributors  to  the 
instruction  and  happiness  of  the  occasion.  These  things, 
without  impairing  in  the  slightest  degree  his  official 
character  or  influence,  brought  him  near  to  thou- 
sands of  business  men  and  people  who  held  no  church 
relations. 

"  Probably  the  general  body  of  the  people  of  Omaha 
has  never  contributed  so  liberally  to  any  one  religious 


138  JSisbop  Glarfcson 

enterprise,  as  to  the  beautiful  cathedral  which  was  his 
last  and  crowning  work,  — fit  monument  to  his  memory. 
How  much  of  this  was  due  to  the  universal  respect  and 
regard  begotten  of  his  deep  interest  in  the  general  pros- 
perity and  growth  of  the  city  of  his  residence  ! 

"  The  highest  attribute  of  citizenship  is  patriotism. 
The  scholar  who  preferred  poverty  and  toil  in  his  own 
country,  to  wealth  and  a  title  of  nobility  on  condition  of 
expatriation,  gave  to  the  world  one  of  its  noblest  ex- 
amples of  human  virtue.  Bishop  Clarkson  lived  in 
times  which  intensified  his  natural  love  for  his  country. 
He  saw  nothing  in  his  ecclesiastical  office  to  divorce 
him  from  the  duties  of  citizenship.  He  was  master  of 
the  history  and  frame  of  the  government,  and  to  him 
his  country  was  a  living  presence.  It  was  not  in  his 
nature  to  hate  anything  ;  but  he  believed  in  the  sover- 
eignty and  supremacy  of  the  federal  government  within 
its  sphere,  and  he  accepted  with  all  his  heart  every  act 
and  construction  necessary  to  maintain  it  inviolate.  He 
saw,  as  all  clear  sighted  men  see,  that  upon  no  other 
foundation  could  a  permanent  nationality  rest ;  and  it 
was  doubtless  one  of  the  felicities  of  his  life,  that  he 
lived  to  see  the  great  North  American  Republic  at 
peace  upon  the  only  question  which  ever  menaced  its 
existence. 

"  Nebraska  has  attained  a  population  of  perhaps  seven 
hundred  thousand  people.1  It  has  made  unexampled 
strides  in  prosperity.  It  has  railways,  mills,  banks, 
herds,  farms,  and  the  ten  thousand  forms  of  material 
wealth.  All  these  things  are  constantly  increasing.  The 
greed  for  wealth,  sharpened  by  indulgence,  but  never 
satisfied  by  acquisition,  seldom  actually  curbed  by  any 
1  This  was  the  population  of  Nebraska  in  1884. 


IBtsbop  Clarfeson  139 

moral  restraint,  expands  its  deathly  foliage  over  the 
citizen,  the  family,  and  the  State — until  many  of  the  best 
people  come  to  believe,  or  live  as  if  they  believed,  the 
husks  of  life  were  its  fruit  and  flower.  The  character  of 
the  State  is  in  the  moral,  intellectual,  and  spiritual 
exaltation  of  its  people.  The  deathless  memories  of  the 
earth  are  not  of.  cash  accumulations,  but  of  heroic  deeds, 
glorified  spirits,  intellectual  conquests,  sacrifices  of  men's 
selves,  education,  refinement,  culture,  moral,  intellectual, 
and  spiritual  exaltation.  His  faultless  taste,  his  sympa- 
thetic eloquence,  his  simple  manners,  his  pervading 
charity,  his  contagious  sympathy,  left  every  community 
he  visited  wiser,  nobler,  and  better  than  he  found  it." 


Bishop  Brooke 


IX 

Bisbop  Brooke 

THE  RIGHT  REVEREND  DR.   PHILLIPS  BROOKS, 
BISHOP  OF  MASSACHUSETTS 

'T'HE  Reverend  Dr.  Phillips  Brooks, 
rector  of  Trinity  Church,  Boston,  was 
consecrated  Bishop  of  Massachusetts  on 
October  14,  1891.  He  died  on  January  23, 
1893.  In  other  words,  his  episcopate  was  only 
little  more  than  fifteen  months  in  length.  He 
sat  in  only  one  General  Convention,  and  that 
the  convention  held  in  Baltimore  in  October, 
1892.  There  would  be  little,  therefore,  to  be 
told  of  his  life  as  a  bishop,  under  any  circum- 
stances ;  and,  in  his  case,  there  was  the  less, 
because  deliberative  bodies  of  any  sort  but 
slightly  interested  him,  and  ecclesiastical  de- 
liberative bodies  least  of  all.  I  shall  hope, 
therefore,  to  be  indulged,  if,  before  I  recall  the 
brief  recollections  which  I  have  to  rehearse  of 
his  later  years,  I  speak  of  my  earlier  knowledge 

143 


144  JSisbop  £roofcs 

of  him,  when  he  and  I  were  students  together, 
and  reproduce,  in  these  pages,  some  memories 
of  singular  felicity  and  discernment  written  for 
a  clerical  club  in  Boston,  soon  after  his  death, 
by  his  close  and  gifted  friend,  the  Rev.  Dr. 
Charles  A.  L.  Richards. 

Phillips  Brooks  entered  the  Theological 
Seminary  of  Virginia  in  the  autumn  of  1856. 
At  that  time  the  seminary  was  overcrowded, 
not  only  the  main  building  (of  which  there  is 
an  admirable  picture  in  the  Rev.  Dr.  A.  V.  G. 
Allen's  Life  and  Letters  of  Phillips  Brooks, 
and  which  has,  long  since,  disappeared)  but 
another  called  "  St.  John's  in  the  Wilderness," 
occupied  by  the  students,  and  buried  among 
the  trees  that,  before  the  Civil  War,  crowned 
the  seminary  hill,  being  filled  to  the  top. 
It  was  to  the  top  that  young  Brooks,  whose 
height  approximated  to  six  feet  and  four  inches, 
was  relegated ;  and,  when  I  found  him  there, 
he  could  not  stand  up  straight.  Nearly  thirty 
years  after,  when  I  had  become  Bishop  of  New 
York,  at  an  alumni  dinner  of  the  Virginia 
Seminary,  Dr.  Brooks  told  the  story  of  his 
extrication  from  that  dilemma,  and  concluded 
with  expressing  "  the  hope  that  Henry  Potter 
would  continue  to  help  men  to  stand  up 
straight " ;  as,  he  might  have  added,  St.  Paul 


dents  together, 
memories 
written  for 


f-ntered    the    Theological 
i;-;ua  in  the  autumn  of  1856. 
iht  summary  was  overcrowded, 
ajn   building  (of  which  there  is 
>,-««*  in  th^  Rev.  Dr.  A.  V.  G. 
•-/"  Pktilip*  Brooks, 

ThefeigVt  Reverend  Doctor  Phillips' 

another  c^kJV,^       ,    <k  .,  in  j.;-., 

oj  Massachusetts. 


. 
occupied  by   the  students,  and  J»uricd  amontj 

*     From  the  engraving  bv  A.  B.  Hall. 

the  trees  that,  before  the  Civil  War,  crowned 

the    seminary    hill,    being  filled    to    the    top. 

It  was  to  the  top  that  young  Brooks,  whose 

height  approximated  to  six  feet  and  four  inches, 

was  relegated  ;  and,  when  I  found  him  there, 

ould  not  stand  up  straight      Nearly  thirty 

after,  when  I  had  become  Bishop  of  New 

an  alumni    djnner   of    the    Virginia 

Dr.    Brooks  told   the  story  of  his 

p.xi.-K  *!«im   from  that  dilemma,  and  concluded 

the  hope  that  Henry  Potter 

to   help    men    to    stand    up 

might  have  added,  St.  Paul 


3Bisbop  JBroofes  145 

had  done  at  Lystra  (Acts  xiv.,  10).  In  the 
Impressions  of  Phillips  Brooks,  by  Dr.  Richards, 
to  which  I  have  already  referred,  the  writer 
tells  the  story  of  that  somewhat  monastic 
life  to  which  a  young  school-teacher  who  had 
not  found  it  his  vocation  to  govern  unruly 
boys  turned,  when  he  recognised  his  call  to 
the  ministry.  It  cannot  be  pretended  that  he 
found  in  the  Virginia  Seminary  a  congenial 
intellectual  atmosphere.  By  a  fortunate  coin- 
cidence, he  enjoyed,  there,  the  friendship  of 
two  men, — Charles  A,  L.  Richards  and  George 
A.  Strong,  who  were,  all  his  life  long,  perhaps 
his  closest  friends,  and  whose  wide  culture  and 
scholarly  tastes  were  to  him  like  a  draught  of 
cool  water  to  parched  lips.  But,  otherwise,  the 
atmosphere  in  which  he  found  himself  in 
Virginia  was  quite  unlike  that  which  he  had 
left  behind  him  in  Massachusetts ;  and  the 
great  majority  of  his  fellow-students  in  the 
seminary,  instead  of  admiring,  or  appreciat- 
ing, his  varied  reading  and  classical  culture, 
accounted  both  as  notes  of  a  somewhat  pagan 
ideal  of  learning. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  narrow  routine  of 
a  pietistic  life,  in  the  midst  of  which  he  found 
himself  at  the  seminary,  must  have  been 
equally  surprising  and  perplexing  to  the  young 


146  JSisbop  JSroofes 

graduate  of  Harvard.  Most  of  all,  the  physi- 
cal hardships  and  privations  of  his  Virginia 
student  life,  to  one  who  had  been  nurtured 
amid  the  less  casual  and  more  orderly  char- 
acteristics of  New  England  housekeeping 
must  have  been  irritating  and  distasteful. 
Other  men,  bred  as  he  had  been,  could  not 
endure  them;  and  I  remember  very  well  a 
New  Englander,  who  afterwards  in  his  min- 
istry, both  as  priest  and  bishop,  won  high 
distinction,  who  was  reported  to  have  left  the 
seminary  and  gone  elsewhere  for  his  theologi- 
cal training,  because  the  beds  were  so  hard ! 
But  I  cannot  recall  a  single  reference,  on 
Brooks's  part,  to  any  of  these  things,  that  was 
other  than  playful.  He  refused  to  regard 
them  seriously;  and,  though,  as  Dr.  Allen's 
biography  of  him  shows,  he  wrote  his  father 
of  what  he  thought  the  unsatisfactory  char- 
acter of  the  teaching  of  the  institution,  as  not 
realising  his  ideal  of  wide  and  varied  scholar- 
ship, he  early  discerned,  beneath  its  superficial 
aspects  whether  material  or  intellectual,  the 
reality  of  that  life  which,  for  the  Christian 
student,  or  minister,  is  of  pre-eminent  impor- 
tance,— the  life  that  is  spiritual. 

Indeed,  I  am  tempted  at  this  point  to  insist 
perhaps  with  more  emphasis  than  have  any  of 


SSisbop  JSroofes  147 

his  biographers  upon  the  enduring  value  of  his 
seminary  life.  A  nature  so  intellectually  and 
emotionally  intense  as  his  could  not  have  been 
reared  merely  amid  choicer  intellectual  en- 
vironments, without  the  benumbing  of  sym- 
pathies which,  later,  flowered  into  such  rare 
service  for  God  and  man.  What  he  was  in 
Philadelphia,  and,  later,  whether  as  rector  or 
bishop,  in  Boston,  he  was,  in  part  at  any  rate, 
because  his  ministerial  training  had  begun  in 
Virginia.  And  yet,  when  that  training  was 
ended,  and  he  went  to  his  parish  in  Pennsyl- 
vania, he  did  not  at  the  beginning,  at  any  rate, 
reveal  the  power  that  was  in  him.  Says  the 
Rev.  Dr.  Richards  in  the  "Remembrances" 
to  which  I  have  already  referred  : 

"  At  the  first  of  his  ministry  in  Philadelphia  the  fame 
of  Henry  Wise,  with  his  cadaverous  look,  his  burning 
eyes,  his  Southern  intensity  of  manner,  his  rare  facility 
of  speech,  quite  overshadowed  any  later  comer  in  the 
field.  Brooks  told  me  once,  that,  exchanging  with  Wise, 
he  found  himself  among  the  congregation  after  the 
service  was  over  and  heard  a  neighbour  say  :  '  You 
wouldn't  have  caught  me  here  to-night  if  I  had  not 
thought  to  hear  Wise.'  Brooks,  not  at  all  the  traditional 
sort  of  eloquent  divine,  at  first  failed  of  recognition. 
Gradually  people  came  to  see  that  this  tall  young  fellow, 
whom  the  great  Dr.  Vinton  so  often  asked  to  preach  for 
him,  was  head  and  shoulders  above  his  brethren  in 
something  more  than  stature;  that  he  had  a  message  for 


148  JSisbop  36roofes 

ears  that  knew  how  to  hear,  and  that  he  had  no  occasion 
to  shelter  himself  behind  Ward  Beecher's  maxim  that 
'everything  must  be  young  before  it  is  old;  and  there- 
fore Providence  permits  young  ministers.'  I  can  hear, 
now,  Dr.  Vinton's  deep  voice  with  a  tone  of  surprise  in 
it,  after  one  of  those  sermons  in  the  dusk  of  a  winter 
afternoon  in  that  great  church,  as  he  said  with  convic- 
tion, '  Why,  he 's  an  orator.'  It  gave  Brooks,  in  his  mod- 
est way,  keen  pleasure  to  be  invited,  later,  when  he  was 
called  to  the  Church  of  the  Holy  Trinity,  to  succeed 
Dr.  Vinton,  the  pastor  of  his  boyhood  in  St.  Paul's,  Bos- 
ton, an  unmistakable  king  of  men,  who  loomed  up  in  the 
eyes  of  one  trained  under  his  preaching  into  even  more 
than  his  actual  proportions.  When  the  flattering  call 
came  it  was  declined.  Presently,  with  urgency,  it 
was  repeated.  Mr.  Brooks,  the  elder,  hastened  to  the 
scene,  with  natural  parental  alarm  at  his  son's  being 
thrust  into  a  place  of  such  responsibility.  Aware  of  my 
familiar  acquaintance  with  Phillips,  he  asked  me  what  I 
thought  of  it.  I  told  him  I  had  no  question  of  Brooks's 
abundant  ability  for  that  or  any  other  pulpit;  but  I  was 
anxious  lest  the  quantity  of  work  in  so  large  a  field 
might  overtax  him.  With  a  look  of  relief,  he  replied, 
'  If  you  will  answer  for  his  brains,  I  will  answer  for  all 
the  rest  of  him.  He  never  found  anything  hard  in  his 
life.'  I  sometimes  suspect  that  he  never  did,  to  the  very 
last  of  it.  There  was  never  any  apparent  effort,  no 
matter  what  load  was  laid  upon  him.  He  worked  not 
merely  with  a  will,  but  without  friction.  He  was  at  my 
house,  once,  on  Thursday  in  Holy  Week,  a  little  fagged 
with  the  Lenten  labours.  He  was  to  preach  on  Good 
Friday  morning,  make  an  address  to  his  people  in  the 
afternoon,  talk  to  the  soldiers  at  a  hospital  Saturday 


Bisbop  Broofes  149 

noon,  and  have  a  preparatory  lecture  Saturday  evening, 
preach  on  Easter  Day,  morning  and  night,  and  have  a 
talk  to  his  Sunday  School  between  times.  And  nothing 
of  it  all  was  ready.  The  days  of  '  hustlers '  in  the  min- 
istry were  not  yet ;  and  to  my  inexperienced  vision  the 
prospect  was  appalling.  But  he  was  as  serene  as  mid- 
summer. The  half-dozen  sermons  and  addresses  fell 
into  line  as  the  season  came  for  each  ;  and  each  did  its 
work  efficiently.  I  took  pains  to  inquire  of  those  who 
heard  him.  And  this  was  in  his  early  ministry." 

And  it  was  characteristic  of  his  later  ministry 
also.  Indeed,  it  was  one  of  the  mysteries,  to 
some  of  those  who  knew  and  loved  him  best, 
who  sympathised  with  his  "  point  of  view,"  and 
turned  with  a  joy  equal  to  his  to  the  tasks 
which  he  and  they  were  called  to  do,  that  he 
could  face  them  always  so  cheerily  ;  and  that, 
behind  the  man's  tasks,  as,  steadily,  as  his 
years  ripened,  they  grew  and  greatened,  there 
was  always  the  boy's  heart,  revealing  itself  in 
a  certain  glad  exuberance,  even  when  he  found 
himself  face  to  face  with  the  tremendous  bur- 
dens of  the  episcopate.  To  the  friend  from 
whose  "  Remembrances  "  I  have  been  quoting, 
he  writes  on  the  eve  of  his  consecration  : 

"  Yes,  the  bishops  have  consented,  and  I  am  to  be  con- 
secrated on  Wednesday,  the  i4th  of  October,  in  Trinity 
Church,  Boston.  You  will  come,  won't  you  ?  You  have 
seen  me  through  so  much  of  life  that  I  am  sure  you  will 


ISQ  JBtsbop  Broofes 

not  refuse  me  this,  and  I  promise  not  to  be  made  any- 
thing else  as  long  as  I  live. 

"  When  I  think  how  much  of  other  people's  thoughts 
I  have  dared  to  occupy  for  the  last  three  months,  I  am 
truly  ashamed  of  myself ;  but  it  has  not  been  my  fault. 
And  now  it  is  over,  and  I  shall  go  into  the  upper  house, 
and  be  forgotten. 

"  I  have  been  visiting  Arthur  :  next  week  I  go  for  a 
few  days  to  John.  I  feel  like  Jephthah's  daughter  on 
her  round  of  farewell  visits,  and  as  if  I  were  never  going 
to  see  anybody  any  more.  On  my  way  to  Arthur  I 

stopped  and  saw  Bishop  ,  who  was  kind,  and 

talked  as  if  he  had  always  known  that  I  could  say  the 
Apostles'  and  Nicene  Creeds,  and  had  wanted  me  in  the 
House  of  Bishops  from  the  start." 

And  then  the  last  lines  of  December  29, 
1892  : 

"  I  spent  the  Feast  of  the  Nativity  with  Arthur.  One 
of  the  strange  things  about  the  new  place  "  (he  means 
the  bishop's  place)  "  is  that  one  is  freest  on  the  days 
which  used  to  be  the  least  free.  Nobody  wants  a  bishop 
on  Christmas  or  Good  Friday.  So  Arthur  took  me  in, 
and  I  preached  for  him  morning  and  afternoon.  William 
and  his  family  went  on,  also,  and  we  had  a  big  family 
dinner  on  Monday  evening,  and  played  childish  games 
till  midnight  ;  and  it  was  all  very  simple,  and  silly,  and 
delightful.  I  did  not  stay  for  the  cathedral  corner- 
stone. I  like  to  do  my  pageants  in  Chicopee,  and  Van 
Deusenville  :  New  York  is  far  too  big  and  bumptious  ; 
Potter  may  have  that  to  himself." 

In    concluding  his    "  Remembrances "    Dr. 


IBisbop  Brooks  151 

Richards  sums  up  his  impressions  of  Bishop 
Brooks  in  sentences  that  are  marked  by  a 
singularly  impartial  and  acute  discernment : 

"  Brooks  was  not  a  profound  scholar.  He  was  well 
grounded  in  his  classics,  and  full  of  the  spirit  of  the 
ancient  masters  in  literature,  but  I  think  rarely  reverted 
to  the  Greek  and  Latin  writers.  He  read  French  with 
delight.  Its  lucidity  was  congenial  to  him.  He  read 
German  with  some  facility.  He  was  a  wide  reader,  but 
by  no  means  an  omnivorous  reader  in  his  own  tongue. 
I  do  not  think  he  was  familiar  with  the  earlier  English 
writers,  or  with  the  modern  German  scholars,  as 
Washburn,  for  example,  was.  Of  late  years  he  had 
small  time  for  reading,  yet  he  was  always  well  abreast  of 
current  thought,  and  knew  whatever  was  most  worth 
while  in  literature.  He  was  not  a  constructive  theologian. 
Religious  thought  did  not  assume  a  dogmatic  shape  with 
him.  I  do  not  know  that  he  can  be  called  a  great,  or 
original,  thinker.  I  say  this  hesitatingly,  for  I  am  aware 
others  differ  from  me.  Yet  it  might  be  difficult  to  point 
out  in  his  published  volumes,  any  leading  thought  which 
could  not  be  traced  to  older  sources  in  Arnold  and 
Whately,  in  Robertson,  Maurice  and  Stanley,  in  McLeod 
Campbell,  and  Horace  Bushnell.  He  was  not  a  great 
organiser  of  institutions.  They  sprang  up  under  his 
impulse,  but  others  shaped  them.  He  rather  under- 
valued the  administrative  men,  thought  they  made  too 
much  of  their  convenient  and  serviceable  gift,  and  were 
ranked  higher  in  the  common  esteem  than  the  occasion 
called  for.  He  was  not  a  fiery  champion  of  causes  or 
leader  of  multitudes,  like  Wesley  or  Luther.  His  words 
were  not  half  battles,  like  Luther's.  They  were  victorious 
marches  across  the  field.  They  were  serene  influences, 


152  Bisbop  JBroofts 

filling  the  air  like  sunshine.  Men  breathed  them  as 
health  into  their  lungs.  Personally,  he  was  a  great 
character.  Intellectually,  we  might  call  him  a  genius  of 
the  highest  order  in  the  application  of  the  good  news  of 
Christ  to  everyday,  modern  life.  His  distinction  and 
originality  were  there. 

"  Others  have  shared  his  profound  faith  and  broad, 
inclusive  love  ;  but  who  has  had  such  buoyancy  of  hope 
as  he  ?  such  sublime  confidence  that  all  must  come 
right  in  God's  own  world,  which  Jesus  was  born  in  and 
died  for,  where  the  Holy  Spirit  was  a  deathless  presence 
and  power  ?  Partly  it  was  a  native  endowment,  partly  it 
had  been  developed  by  the  rare  happiness  of  his  life  ; 
but  it  was  a  Christian  grace  also,  cultivated  through 
seasons  of  anxiety  and  of  sorrow,  ripened  by  experience 
of  what  good  things  God  had  wrought.  The  young 
were  drawn  to  him,  as  to  one  who,  in  this  as  in  so  much 
else,  never  ceased  to  be  a  boy,  and  the  old  retricked 
their  beams,  and  found  '  glad,  confident  morning '  again. 
It  was  a  hopefulness  that  did  not  make  him  rash  or  pre- 
sumptuous, but  only  glad  and  humble,  and  calmly  ex- 
pectant ;  sure  of  God's  great  purpose  and  tender  mercy, 
sure  that  man  was  able  to  hold  countless  treasures  from 
the  divine  influx  ;  sure  that  God  was  ever  reaching  out 
towards  the  accomplishment  of  his  ideal  for  humanity 
once  revealed  to  us  in  Jesus  Christ.  All  things  were  at 
work  for  his  good,  our  good,  all  men's  good,  and  what 
glories  were  in  reserve  so  soon  as  we  loved  the  Lord 
Jesus  !  It  was  a  hope  so  strong  and  vital  as  at  times  to 
seem  unreasoning.  Leave  God  out  of  the  premises,  it 
was  indeed  unreasonable.  But  holding  to  Him,  anchored 
within  the  veil,  it  had  a  right  to  be,  and  never  fog  could 
damp,  nor  storm  could  shake  it. 


JSisbop  IBroofes  153 

"  Bishop  Brooks,  as  I  have  said,  was  rarely  fortunate 
in  his  life  ;  in  his  native  gifts,  his  home  influences,  his 
early  associations,  the  occasions  and  opportunities  that 
were  opened  to  him.  The  vicissitudes  of  the  few  years  of 
our  national  struggle,  at  the  outset  of  his  ministry, 
developed  and  educated  him  ;  the  conflict  with  slavery 
intensified  his  manhood  ;  the  new  movement  in  theology 
made  room  for  him,  stimulated  his  intellect,  and 
broadened  his  range.  He  grew  in  New  England  as  a 
strong  tree  in  congenial  soil.  The  passing  storms  or 
droughts  only  sent  the  roots  deeper  and  gave  them 
firmer  foothold.  Under  his  widespread  boughs  how 
large  a  flock  at  last  found  shelter  ! " 

As  I  began  by  saying,  Bishop  Brooks's 
episcopate  was  very  brief  ;  but  not  so  brief  as 
to  be  without  significant  and  suggestive  notes. 
One  may  venture  to  affirm,  now,  what  no 
record  of  his  life  has  seen  fit  quite  candidly  to 
recognise, — that  there  cannot  be  the  smallest 
doubt  that,  toward  the  end  of  his  life,  his  mind 
underwent  a  fundamental  change  as  to  the 
episcopate.  He  was  a  man  of  ideas ;  and,  as 
such,  he  did  not  greatly  value  institutions. 
He  gloried  in  "the  living  creature  within  the 
wheels," — for  the  wheels,  themselves,  he  did 
not  greatly  care ;  and  of  this  he  made  no 
secret.  His  prophetic  office,  as  a  preacher,  he 
regarded  as  the  highest  of  all  the  ministerial 
callings ;  and  he  regarded  bishops,  usually, 


154  Bisbop  JBroofcs 

with  a  good-natured  condescension  which  did 
not  trouble  itself  to  understand  their  office,  or 
to  appreciate  its  influence.  In  all  this,  he  was 
seconded  by  a  chorus  of  divines,  who  were 
careful  never  to  contradict  him,  and  who,  in 
this  glorification  of  the  preacher's  office,  caught 
the  reflected  lustre  of  their  own.  It  was  to 
these  adoring  followers  a  rude  blow  when  they 
found  that  their  idol  was  willing  to  be  a 
bishop, — nay,  not  only  willing,  but  anxious  ; 
and  they  looked  into  one  another's  faces  with 
a  dismay  which  found  no  alleviation  in  the 
sphinx-like  silence  of  their  leader. 

But  upon  the  mind  of  their  leader  there 
had  broken,  late  and  slowly,  a  new  light.  He 
came  to  see  that,  in  the  episcopate,  one  might 
find  the  largest  opportunity  for  the  largest 
powers.  He  came  to  see  that  what  he  had 
reckoned  a  calling  of  dry  routine  might  be 
transformed — and  that  with  no  violent  dis- 
memberment of  its  component  parts — into  a 
ministry  of  noblest  opportunities  and  of  most 
potential  service.  And  nothing  is  finer  in  his 
whole  history  than  the  frankness  with  which, 
when  once  he  discerned  this,  he  set  about  re- 
alising it.  I  have  referred,  elsewhere,1  to  the 
sublime  reticence  with  which,  during  the  time 

1  See  in  Law  and  Loyalty,  p.  263,  a  sermon  preached  at  the  con- 
secration of  Phillips  Brooks. 


3Bisbop  Brooks  155 

that  elapsed  between  his  election  to  the  episco- 
pate, and  his  consecration  as  Bishop  of  Massa- 
chusetts, he  endured  in  an  heroic  silence,  and 
with  uncomplaining  patience,  the  attacks  which, 
from  so  many  quarters,  were  hurled  at  him  by 
fellow-Churchmen  because  of  what  was  alleged 
to  be  his  doctrinal  unsoundness.  But,  in  truth 
this  was  but  a  part  of  that  nobler  whole  which 
disclosed  itself  after  he  became  a  bishop.  As  a 
presbyter  he  had  not  been  over-careful  about 
rubrics,  canons,  and  the  rest,  and  there  was 
undoubtedly  a  considerable  contingent  among 
those  who  had,  until  his  consecration,  been  his 
fellow-presbyters,  who  looked  to  see  him  illus- 
trate in  his  episcopate  a  fine  disdain  for  laws 
and  forms.  But,  if  they  did,  they  were  doomed 
to  be  woefully  disappointed.  From  the  time 
that  Bishop  Brooks  turned  his  face  toward 
the  episcopal  office,  he  saw,  as  though  it  had 
broken  upon  him  in  a  strong  light,  that  the 
office  of  religion  is  both  inspirational  and  or- 
ganic ; — that  there  cannot  be  life  in  the  di- 
vine society,  without  the  incarnation  of  that  life; 
and  that  the  moment  one  has  gotten  that  far, 
the  inevitable  necessity  that  the  life  organic 
must  be  a  life  of  law,  of  rule,  of  related  forces, 
—of  authority,  in  one  word, — and  of  obedience, 
becomes  overwhelmingly  clear. 


156  JSiabop  56roofes 

It  is  from  this  point  of  view  that  the  brief  epis- 
copate of  Bishop  Brooks  derives  the  highest  lus- 
tre. His  predecessors,  and  especially  that  one 
whom  he  immediately  followed,  had  been  men 
who  had  found,  in  canon  law,  an  imperative 
voice ;  and  when  Bishop  Brooks  succeeded 
them,  the  world  looked  to  see  this  man  of 
genius,  this  preacher  of  inspired  power  treat 
all  homage  for  red-tape  with  large  contempt. 
As  a  matter  of  fact,  they  saw  nothing  of  the 
sort.  Never  was  there  a  sublimer  illustration 
of  these  words  of  the  centurion  captain,  "  I  also 
am  a  man  set  under  authority,  having  under 
me  soldiers."1  He  vindicated  his  right  to  rule, 
by  his  readiness  to  obey.  He  recognised  that, 
under  a  constitutional  form  of  government, 
such  as  that  of  the  Church,  there  cannot  be 
anything  save  anarchy,  unless  they  who  admin- 
ister the  law  obey  it ;  and  his  obedience  was  as 
scrupulous  as  it  was  cheerful. 

But  he  did  not  love  lawmaking,  and  he  did  not 
pretend  to.  In  the  only  General  Convention 
in  which  he  sat  he  was  one  of  the  junior  bishops; 
and  his  place,  as  such,  in  the  House  of  Bishops, 
was  near  the  door.  I  was  going  out  of  it,  one 
day  when,  as  I  passed  his  seat,  he  plucked  my 
sleeve  and,  drawing  me  down,  whispered  in  my 
ear,  "Henry,  is  it  always  as  dull  as  this?' 

1  St.  I. uke  vii.,  8. 


JBisbop  Broofes  157 

It  was  inevitable  that,  to  him,  the  House  of 
Bishops  should  be  dull.  As  a  newcomer, 
there,  he  was  expected  to  be  silent ;  and  as 
a  listener  he  could  hope  only  to  hear  rather 
dry  discussions  concerning  terms  and  phrases 
in  which  he  could  find  little  to  interest  him. 
But  the  fine  feature  in  that  whole  situation  con- 
sisted in  his  scrupulous  attendance,  and  in  his 
painstaking  attention.  Parliamentary  techni- 
calities, canonical  amendments,  titular  designa- 
tions and  distinctions,  in  no  wise  appealed  to 
him.  But  he  followed  the  business  of  the 
House  with  scrupulous  vigilance,  and — with 
one  exception — in  unbroken  silence. 

That  exception  had  in  it  a  note  of  such 
absolute  simplicity  and  almost  boyish  enthu- 
siasm that  I  cannot  but  recall  it. 

We  were  listening  to  the  report  of  the  joint 
committee  on  the  Hymnal.  Originally,  as 
some  of  my  readers  will  remember,  there  was, 
bound  up  with  the  Prayer  Book,  a  metrical  ver- 
sion of  certain  psalms,  and  a  selection  of  hymns, 
little  more  than  two  hundred  in  number  and  of 
very  variable  quality.  It  had  been  decided  to 
substitute  for  these  a  proper  Hymnal ;  and  the 
best  talent  in  the  Church  had,  for  two  or  three 
General  Conventions,  and  for  the  years  be- 
tween them,  devoted  itself,  bishops,  presbyters, 


158  JBlsbop  Broofes 

and  laymen,  to  the  preparation  of  this  Hym- 
nal. At  last  the  work  was  completed ;  and, 
after  considerable  previous  discussion,  the 
committee  submitted  the  book  in  the  House 
of  Bishops  for  its  final  adoption. 

Until  this  time,  Bishop  Brooks  had  not,  so 
far  as  I  can  remember,  opened  his  lips  in  the 
House  of  Bishops.  But,  as  the  chairman  of 
the  joint  committee  on  the  Hymnal  sat  down, 
the  bishop  rose,  with  his  characteristic  modesty, 
and  spoke  in  substance  as  follows : 

"  One  can  readily  understand,  and  heartily  sympathise 
with,  many  of  the  changes  in  our  collection  of  hymns  of 
which  the  able  report  of  the  joint  committee  is  the 
evidence.  There  is  a  most  gratifying  enlargement  of  the 
old  collection,  and  some  hymns  which  obviously  were 
scarcely  worthy  of  a  place  in  it  have  disappeared.  But 
a  hymn  has  two  values,  one  of  which  is  doctrinal,  and 
the  other  literary,  and  added  to  these  is  that  often 
mightiest  power  which  comes  from  association.  I 
venture  to  submit,  Mr.  Chairman,  that  that  last  is  pre- 
eminently true  of  the  hymn  beginning  '  How  firm  a 
foundation,  ye  saints  of  the  Lord.'  " 

And  along  that  line  the  Bishop  of  Massa- 
chusetts spoke  with  great  tenderness  and 
power.  He  made  no  high  claim  for  the  hymn 
on  the  ground  of  its  literary  merits  ;  but  he 
dwelt  with  persuasive  earnestness  upon  its  very 
sacred  associations  with  the  deepest  life  of 


Bisbop  Broofes  159 

individual  believers  ;  and  concluded  by  express- 
ing his  regret  that  the  committee  had  seen  fit 
to  omit  it,  and  he  then  made  a  motion  that  it 
be  restored. 

As  he  sat  down,  there  sprang  to  his  feet  a 
bishop  who  had  most  vehemently  opposed  his 
confirmation,  and  who  was  generally  reckoned 
to  have  been  the  most  active  foe  to  his  admis- 
sion to  the  House  of  Bishops.  With  impassioned 
eloquence,  he  seconded  the  motion  of  the 
Bishop  of  Massachusetts,  and  expressed,  with 
vehement  speech,  his  delight  in  doing  so,  and 
his  hearty  concurrence  with  every  argument 
that  the  bishop  had  used.  Without  further 
debate  the  vote  was  taken  on  the  resolution, 
and  carried  by  a  large  majority  ;  and  the  hymn 
(No.  636)  may  be  found  to-day  in  the  episcopal 
Hymnal. 

Its  author,  as  some  who  read  these  words 
may  remember,  was  Keen,  not  like  Neale, 
Wesley,  Toplady,  Watts,  Frances  Havergal,  or 
others,  famous  for  hymn  writing,  or  otherwise. 
But  the  hymn  is  interwoven  with  the  child-life 
of  many  devout  men,  and,  as  doubtless  was  the 
case  in  this  instance,  with  memories  of  a 
sainted  mother.  And  who  shall  say  what 
thoughts  awoke  in  the  breast  of  this  man  of 
genius  who  combined  the  splendour  of  rare  gifts 


160 

with  a  singularly  simple  and  child-like  faith,  as 
he  plead  for  that  grand  old  hymn  ?  Sacred 
were  the  lips  that  once  had  taught  it.  Imperish- 
able was  the  faith  that,  at  a  mother's  knee,  had 
learned  it  ! 


Bishop 


161 


X 

Btebop 


THE  RIGHT  REVEREND    DR.   THOMAS  UNDERWOOD 
DUDLEY,   BISHOP  OF  KENTUCKY 

IN  a  charge  to  the  Diocese  of  Virginia  de- 
livered in  1904  or  1905,  the  Bishop  of  that 
Diocese,  the  Right  Reverend  Robert  A.  Gib- 
son, D.  D.  ,  refers  to  the  various  causes  and 
influences  that  have  led  men  to  turn  their  faces 
toward  the  ministry  ;  and  alludes  especially  to 
the  considerable  number  of  men  who  at  the 
close  of  the  Civil  War,  both  in  the  North  and 
in  the  South,  gave  themselves  to  that  calling. 
There  can  be  no  doubt  about  the  fact,  nor 
as  to  the  striking  illustrations  of  it  which  are 
afforded  by  the  history  of  the  American  Epis 
copate.  In  the  arrangement  of  seats  in  the 
House  of  Bishops  the  juniors  sit  in  the  rear; 
and  I  can  remember  very  well  when,  at  the 
last  General  Convention  in  which  I  was  acting 
as  secretary  of  the  House  of  Bishops,  and,  as 
such,  assigning  seats  and  desks  to  the  newly 

163 


164  J3tsbop  2DuMeg 

consecrated  bishops,  I  found  four  of  them  sit- 
ting in  close  proximity  to  each  other,  every 
one  of  whom  had  been  an  officer  in  the  Con- 
federate service.  Turning  to  that  one  of  them 
who  happened  to  be  nearest  to  me  I  said, 
"  Gentlemen,  I  think  I  shall  have  to  nail  up  a 
copy  of  the  United  States  flag  in  this  corner 
of  the  House! "  Whereupon  dear  Harris,  then 
Bishop  of  Michigan,  promply  responded,  "  Go 
ahead  !  We  can  stand  it — if  you  can!" 

Such  an  incident  explained  the  action  of 
many  noble  men,  and  of  Bishop  Dudley  among 
them.  He  was  a  typical  Southerner;  and,  to 
the  last,  he  never  lost  those  distinctive  quali- 
ties of  speech,  of  temperament,  of  character, 
which  have  so  greatly  endeared  him,  and  hosts 
of  other  Southerners,  to  their  more  frigid  breth- 
ren of  the  North.  His  large  vision  and  rare 
practical  wisdom  restrained  him  from  merely 
impulsive  and  emotional  action  ;  but  no  one 
who  knew  him  could  be  uncertain  as  to  the 
strong  fires  of  deep  affection,  of  high  pur- 
pose, and  of  unbending  devotion  to  duty  that 
glowed  beneath  all  that  he  did.  United  to 
these  qualities,  moreover,  there  was  an  alto- 
gether unusual  gift  of  scholarship,  which  made 
of  him  the  distinguished  Grecian  that  he  was 
in  college,  and,  later,  the  enthusiastic  disciple 


;  H'firfl 


wi^i 

! 


ou 


COIIM  cr.tivd  bishop*,  i  found  four  of  them  sit- 
ting in  closf  proximity  to  each  other,  every 
One  of  whom  had  been  an  officer  in  the  Con- 
fetjk-rat"  -«r\  ict.  Turning  to  that  one  of  them 
who  happ<  n<  d  to  be  nearest  to  iwj  I  said, 
«rn,  1  think  I  shall  have  to  nail  up  a 
copy  of  the  United  States  flag  in  this  corner 
Whereupon  dear  Harris,  then 
Bishop  of  Michigan,  promply  responded,  "Go 
ahead  !  We  can  stand  it — if  you  can!" 

Such  an   incident   explained   the   action   of 

The  Right  Revefend 
mPotiorvTihomas!  Underwood  Dudlef1/^ 
the  last,  he  nBishof)  <lf  ffcefltuck^i™  l 
ties  of  spee^matptWij^N'H^Na^iipf  charact 
which  have  so  greatly  endeared  him.  and  hosts 
of  other  Southerners,  to  their  more  frigid  breth- 
ren of  the   North       Hi*  W^'   vision  and  rare 
practical  wistiom  n^irajn**d   him  from  merely 
HHji-itvt.!  and  f-motional  action  ;  but  no  one 
*!m  km-w  him  could  be  uncertain  as  to  the 
stronj.'    Ares   of  deep    affection,   of  high   pur- 
i»i»»».   and  of  unbending  devotion  to  duty  that 
^-i'.-.vf  .1    beneath  all  that   he  did.      United   to 
•<'.:•   ^    .j-;a!n!«.'s,   moreover,  there  was  an  al to- 
ri usual  gift  of  scholarship,  which  made 
distinguished   Grecian   that  he  was 
ind,   later,  the  enthusiastic  disciple 


IBisbop  2>ufcel£  165 

of  that  rare  thinker,  Dr.  William  Sparrow,  at 
whose  feet  he  sat  in  the  Theological  Seminary 
of  Virginia. 

Bishop  Dudley  was  born  on  September 
26,  1837,  in  Richmond,  Virginia,  and  his  an- 
cestry bound  him  to  that  illustrious  Common- 
wealth by  ties  that  were  never  broken.  It  was 
natural  that  the  son  of  such  a  lineage  should 
be  entered  in  due  time  at  the  University  of 
Virginia,  and  he  was  graduated  there  in  1858. 
From  Dr.  L.  M.  Blackford,  now  the  Principal 
of  the  Episcopal  High  School  of  Virginia, 
which  is  situated  some  three  miles  west  of 
Alexandria,  and  not  far  from  the  Theological 

o 

Seminary  of  Virginia,  I  have  been  so  fortun- 
ate as  to  secure  the  following  letter : 

" .  .  .  The  late  Bishop  Dudley  and  I,  being  about 
the  same  age,  entered  the  University  of  Virginia  to- 
gether in  October,  1855,  and  we  were  intimate  there  as 
well  as  ever  after.  We  had  never  met  before  entering 
the  University,  so  that  I  am  unable  to  give  you  any  in- 
formation as  to  his  school  life,  I  remember  that  he  came 
to  college  direct  from  the  Hanover  Academy,  Va. ,  of 
which  Lewis  M.  Coleman,  M.  A. ,  was  head  master,  a 
noted  academy  in  those  days.  Coleman  afterwards  be- 
came professor  of  Latin  in  the  University,  and,  later,  a 
colonel  of  artillery  in  the  Confederate  service,  in  which 
he  died,  in  the  Battle  of  Fredericksburg.  Dudley  was 
particularly  fond  of  him  and  Coleman  was  proud  of  his 
distinguished  pupil,  at  whose  graduation  in  1858  he  was 


166  JStsbop 

present ;  for  I  remember  seeing  him  congratulate  Dudley's 
parents  on  that  occasion,  in  the  public  hall.  Dudley's 
earlier  training  was  at  a  day  school  in  Richmond.  " 

It  will  not  be  inappropriate,  though  they  ex- 
tend over  a  much  longer  period,  to  follow  these 
reminiscences  from  one  college  classmate  to 
those  of  another,  Dr.  George  Tucker  Har- 
rison, which  are  not  the  less  valuable  because 
they  have  the  note  of  a  charming  and  absolute 
unreserve: 

"  At  the  university  he  was  one  of  the  most  delightful 
companions,  full  of  life  and  spirits.  He  could  sing  a 
good  song,  and  was  inimitable  as  a  story-teller.  He  en- 
deared himself  greatly  to  his  fellow-students,  being  one 
of  the  kindest-hearted  of  men.  It  is  needless  to  say  also 
that,  being  absolutely  natural,  and  overflowing  with  good 
spirits,  he  was  not  averse  to  a  little  spree,  now  and  then. 
At  the  same  time,  he  was  a  good  student,  and  took  the 
degree  of  Master  of  Arts,  given  only  after  an  under- 
graduate had  passed  in  all  the  schools  of  the  university, 
— ancient  languages,  modern  languages,  moral  philosphy, 
natural  philosophy,  chemistry,  and  mathematics.  The 
University  of  Virginia,  founded  by  Thomas  Jefferson, 
one  of  the  best  educated  men  of  his  day,  and  one  who 
was  far  ahead  of  his  time,  was  entirely  different  (at  that 
period)  from  any  other  university  in  this  country.  Jef- 
ferson brought  all  the  first  professors  from  the  Univer- 
sities of  Oxford,  Cambridge,  and  Dublin,  in  order  that 
the  new  university  should  be  free  from  the  prejudices  of 
any  college  then  existing  in  this  country.  And  it  was 
the  first  college  or  university  to  establish  the  elective 
system. 


JStsbop  E>ufcle£  167 

"  Dudley  was  a  member  of  the  Delta  Kappa  Epsilon. 
He  was  also  a  distinguished  member  of  '  The  Ugly  Club,' 
a  society  got  up  by  some  of  the  choice  spirits  of  his  time, 
and  to  which  the  principal  condition  for  admission — 
besides  being  a  good  fellow — was  abundant  homeliness 
of  appearance.  It  is  not  said  that  Dudley,  however,  ever 
gained  the  annual  prize, — a  pair  of  boots,  given  to  the 
member  who  was  voted  the  'ugliest'  member  !  It  does 
not  seem  possible  that  Bishop  Dudley,  who,  in  later  life, 
with  his  brilliant  dark  eyes  and  intellectual,  kindly  ex- 
pression, was  an  attractive  figure  wherever  he  went, 
could  have  shone  in  this  way  in  '  The  Ugly  Club  '  at  the 
university. 

"  A  love  of  truth  was  one  of  the  foundations  of  his 
character;  and,  in  addresses  to  young  men,  especially,  he 
would  always  hold  up  lofty  ideals,  and  urge  them  never 
to  lower  the  sacred  majesty  of  truth  by  resorting  to  ex- 
pediency. One  of  his  latest  sermons,  preached  at  St. 
Bartholomew's  Church,  New  York,  after  the  death  of  his 
friend  and  school  and  college-mate,  Virginius  Dabney, 
illustrated  this  point  with  great  force.  He  related  how 
Mr.  Dabney,  being  in  great  financial  straits,  refused  to 
avail  himself  of  a  misunderstanding  which  would  have 
placed  him  and  his  family  out  of  the  reach  of  penury. 
A  certain  Civil  Service  post  was  open,  and  Mr.  Dabney 
became  an  applicant  for  it.  Shortly  before  this,  he  had 
had  a  slight  stroke  of  apoplexy,  which  had  left  him  some- 
what lame,  but  had  not  otherwise  impaired  his  physical  or 
mental  health.  His  testimonials  were  such  as  few  men 
have  ever,  before  or  since,  been  able  to  present; — they 
were  letters  from  such  distinguished  men  and  speaking 
in  such  high  terms  of  him.  The  official  in  whose  hands 
the  appointment  lay  called  on  Mr.  Dabney,  and  the 


1 68  JBisbop  2>uMe 

arrangements  for  his  receiving  the  post  were  practically 
completed,  when,  a  day  or  two  later,  this  gentleman  met 
Mr.  Dabney  out  of  doors,  and  said  to  him  :  '  I  am  glad 
to  see  that  you  are  sufficiently  recovered  of  your 
rheumatism,  to  be  able  to  be  out  of  doors  again.'  The 
temptation  to  let  the  misapprehension, — which  meant 
bread  and  butter  for  himself  and  family, — pass  was  very 
great;  but  the  Virginian  said  :  '  Sir,  I  am  too  old  now  to 
commence  to  lie.  I  am  not  suffering  from  rheumatism. 
I  have  had  a  stroke  of  apoplexy.'  The  post  was,  of 
course,  not  given  to  him. 

"  Bishop  Dudley  told  this  story  as  illustrating  the 
height  to  which  the  sense  of  honour  and  truthfulness  may 
lead  a  man.  The  bishop  had  a  magnificent  voice  and 
fine  delivery,  and  was  never  at  a  loss  for  words. 

"When  he  was  in  England  at  the  Lambeth  Confer- 
ence, in  1897,  he  was  introduced  to  King  Edward,  then 
the  Prince  of  Wales.  In  conversation,  the  Prince  re- 
ferred to  his  visit  to  the  States  long  ago,  and  said  he 
had  very  pleasant  reminiscences  of  his  trip  to  Kentucky. 
The  bishop  said  he  hoped  the  Prince  might  be  induced 
to  visit  them  again,  to  which  the  Prince  said,  there  was 
nothing  he  should  like  better.  '  We  boast  of  superiority 
in  three  things  in  Kentucky,'  the  bishop  went  on  ;  'we 
think  we  have  the  most  beautiful  women  in  America; 
the  finest  race-horses;  and  the  best  whiskey.' 

"During  the  last  twenty  years  of  his  life,  Bishop 
Dudley  and  his  wife  and  children  spent  every  summer 
with  his  mother-in-law,  Mrs.  Aldrich,  at  Bay  Shore, 
Long  Island.  He  was  an  enthusiastic  fisherman,  and 
delighted  to  pass  the  long  summer  days  on  the  Great 
South  Bay.  His  devotion  to  Mrs.  Aldrich  was  one  of 
the  sweetest  things  remembered  of  him  by  many.  His 


JSisbop  2>uDle£  169 

courteous  attentions  to  her  were  lover-like,  and  his  atti- 
tude towards  her  certainly  refuted  the  old  idea  of  the 
relations  of  a  man  to  his  mother-in-law.  She  trusted 
him  implicitly,  and  almost  her  last  words,  on  her  death- 
bed, on  hearing  that  Bishop  and  Mrs.  Dudley  had 
arrived,  were,  *  What  a  relief  ! '  And  the  shock  of  her 
death  was  an  indirect  cause  of  his  own,  two  days  later 
in  the  same  house. 

"  He  was  an  indefatigable  worker  among  his  people, 
and  a  favourite  wherever  he  went.  Perhaps  this  was  due, 
partly,  to  his  adaptability.  Out  of  his  luxurious  home 
in  Louisville,  he  was  ready  to  share,  in  his  visitations, 
the  hospitality  of  the  humble  log  cabin;  and  was  wont 
to  tell  of  his  experiences  on  such  occasions.  Over  and 
over  again,  he  spent  the  night  in  a  house  consisting  of 
but  one  room,  which  served  as  kitchen,  parlour,  and 
bedroom.  All  the  members  of  the  family,  six  or  more, 
passed  the  night  there  ;  but,  in  order  to  entertain  the 
bishop  with  due  honour,  they  hung  up  a  blanket  to  divide 
off  a  part  of  the  room  for  him  to  sleep  in  with  some 
privacy. 

"  His  love  of  justice  was  shown  in  one  simple  instance 
— that  of  a  gifted  young  writer,  whose  first  work  was 
severely  attacked  by  ignorant  critics.  After  months  of 
this  persecution,  the  criticism  was  effectually  silenced  by 
William  Dean  Howells,  then  editor  of  Harper's  Drawer 
who,  personally  unacquainted  with  the  young  poet, 
wrote  in  the  magazine  a  long  article  in  praise  of  her 
work.  Bishop  Dudley  sent  Mr.  Howells  a  letter  of 
thanks  in  behalf  of  the  young  author,  which  only  came 
to  the  knowledge  of  her  family  after  her  death,  through 
Mr.  Howells  himself. 

5  The  bishop  was  not  one  to  care  for  indiscriminate 


ijo  JSisbop  H>uMe£ 

praise;  but  he  said  once  to  this  same  young  author  : 
'  My  dear,  nothing  said  of  me  in  print  ever  pleased  me 
more  than  those  simple  words  of  yours,  "  The  rich  flock 
to  listen  to  him,  and  the  common  people  hear  him 
gladly. 

These  characteristic  recollections  of  Dr.  Har- 
rison's may  well  be  followed  by  the  story  of  an 
incident  which  the  Bishop  himself  was  fond  of 
recalling,  because,  like  most  of  his  fellow-men, 
he  enjoyed  being  commended  for  his  profi- 
ciency in  a  craft  which  was  not  his  professed 
calling.  He  was  on  a  hunting  expedition  near 
Louisville,  and  happened  to  fall  in  with  a  local 
sportsman  whose  unconcealed  admiration  for 
the  city  man's  marksmanship  paved  the  way 
for  further  conversation. 

"What's  your  name?"  the  countryman 
finally  inquired. 

"  Dudley,"  was  the  reply. 

After  some  exchange  of  incident  and  experi- 
ence the  bishop's  interlocutor  hazarded  : 

"  Say,  Dudley,  what  business  do  you  fol- 
low?" 

"  I  'm  a  preacher." 

"  Oh,  get  out !     What  are  you  giving  me  ?" 

"  But  I  am.     I  preach  every  Sunday." 

"  Where?" 

"  In  Louisville." 


Bisbop  DuMeg  171 

"  Well,  I  never!  I  never  would  ha'  thought  it. 
You  ain't  stuck  up  a  bit  like  most  of  the 
preachers  ddwn  this  way.  ' 

An  invitation  to  hear  this  new-made  ac- 
quaintance preach  was  accompanied  by  a  scrib- 
bled card,  and  the  next  Lord's  Day  saw  the 
rustic  in  his  "Sunday  best"  ushered  into  the 
bishop's  own  pew,  where  he  listened  intently 
to  both  service  and  sermon. 

He  was  manifestly  amazed,  afterward,  to 
have  the  orator  of  the  morning  come  down  to 
greet  him  as  cordially  and  familiarly  as  in  the 
woods.  He  managed  to  stammer  his  thanks 
and  added: 

"  I  ain'  t  much  of  a  judge  of  this  kind  of 
thing,  parson ;  but  I  riz  with  you,  and  sot 
with  you,  and  saw  the  thing  through  the  best 
I  knew  how.  All  the  same,  if  my  opinion  is 
worth  anything  to  you,  the  Lord  meant  you  for 
a  hunter.  " 

It  would  be  interesting  to  know  how  much 
of  Bishop  Dudley  's  rare  facility  in  translating 
himself  to  "all  sorts  and  conditions  of  men" 
came  from  the  training  which  he  received  in 
the  army.  After  his  graduation  at  the  Univer- 
sity of  Virginia,  he  became  a  professor  of 
Latin  and  Greek  in  the  university,  and  it  was 
there  that  the  Civil  War  found  him.  It  was 


i72  JSisbop 

inevitable  that  he  should  pass,  as  did  others  of 
the  faculty,  and  the  great  mass  of  the  students, 
from  college  walls  to  the  ranks  of  the  army. 
In  Mr.  John  Wise  's  admirable  End  of  an  Era, 
a  book  which,  for  its  side-lights  upon  the  Civil 
War,  and  for  its  singular  combination  of  re- 
serve and  candour,  is  one  of  the  most  valuable 
contributions  to  American  history,  is  a  very 
vivid  picture  of  this  transformation.  It  was  in- 
evitable, as  I  have  said,  that  Dudley  should  be 
influenced  by  it ;  and  I  apprehend  that,  to  the 
end  of  his  episcopate,  if  he  had  been  asked 
what  had  most  helped  to  make  that  episcopate 
potent  for  good,  he  would  have  named  his 
army  life  as  among  such  educative  and  inspir- 
ing powers.  In  the  schools  he  learned  to 
know  books  :  in  the  army  he  learned  to  know 
men  :  and  no  one  who  ever  saw  him  dealing 
with  men  could  be  in  any  doubt  that,  wide  and 
accurate  as  was  his  scholarly  learning,  none  of 
it  could  quite  have  taken  the  place,  or  fur- 
nished the  wisdom,  of  that  large  insight  and 
cool  judgment  born  in  camps. 

But  when  the  life  in  camps  was  ended,  he 
turned,  not  unnaturally,  to  another  and  a 
higher  service.  That  gravitation  toward  the 
ministry  of  which  Bishop  Gibson  has  lately 
spoken,  drew  him  by  a  supreme  attraction  to 


JStsbop  sm&ies  173 

be  the  ordained  soldier  and  servant  of  Jesus 
Christ,  and  the  year  1865  saw  him  a  student 
in  the  Theological  Seminary  of  Virginia. 

A  fellow-student  of  Dudley's,  the  beloved 
and  honoured  Bishop  of  West  Virginia,  has 
favoured  me  with  some  seminary  recollections 
of  Dudley,  which  I  transcribe  precisely  as 
written. 

"  In  regard  to  Bishop  Dudley's  seminary  career,  I 
make  note  of  certain  things  that  may  be  of  interest. 
He  was  by  far  the  best  furnished  man  that  we  had,  and 
we  all  recognised  it,  the  faculty  included.  He  seems  to 
have  been  a  special  favourite  of  Dr.  Sparrow,  who  really 
taught\ivco.  a  great  deal,  for  his  studies  had  not  previously 
been  along  theological  lines.  On  one  occasion  Dr.  Spar- 
row asked  him  in  class  some  question  regarding  the  lect- 
ure of  the  day  before.  In  reply,  Dudley  gave  an  answer 
just  the  opposite  of  the  doctor's  contention.  Everybody 
was  very  much  surprised,  and  the  good  doctor,  rapping 
his  fingers  on  the  arms  of  his  chair,  as  was  his  wont, 
looked  quietly  up  and  said  :  'Well,  Mr.  Dudley,  doctors 
will  differ! ' 

"  While  in  his  senior  year,  the  Rev.  Dr.  N.  H. 
Schenck,  then  rector  of  Emmanuel,  Baltimore,  came  to 
the  seminary  to  try  to  get  Dudley  to  take  charge  of  his 
church  during  his  absence  of  three  or  four  months.  He 
had  sense  enough  to  decline,  but  the  offer  shows  the 
esteem  in  which  he  was  held  and  how  his  reputation 
had  gone  beyond  the  seminary  walls. 

"  Our  rooms  were  just  opposite,  and  of  course  I  saw  a 
great  deal  of  him  ; — he  delighted  in  Hooker,  and  intro- 


174  Bisbop  2>uMe£ 

duced  among  us  Brown  on  the  Gospels  and  Goul- 
burn's  Thoughts  on  Personal  Religion.  I  have  known  of 
his  giving  this  latter  book  to  several  persons; — it  was  a 
great  favourite  with  him. 

"  He  was  a  great  admirer  of  Dr.  Packard.  One  even- 
ing at  the  doctor's  table,  when  Dudley  had  been  taking 
off  some  one — I  think,  Dr.  Minnegerode — Dr.  Packard 
said  :  '  I  should  not  like  to  think  that  any  one  took  me 
off  in  that  way.'  '  Well,'  said  his  wife,  '  I  have  no 
doubt  but  that  you  are  thus  taken  off  as  are  others.' 
'  No,'  said  the  doctor,  '  that  cannot  be,  because  there  is 
nothing  about  me  they  can  use  in  such  a  way.' 

"  We  used  to  go  to  Bishop  Johns'  a  good  deal,  and  the 
last  week  of  the  session,  on  missionary  evening,  we  were 
there  together,  and  after  tea  we  started  on  ahead  just 
enough  to  open  the  gate  for  the  bishop,  who  was  going 
over  to  the  chapel  in  his  carriage.  The  old  gentleman, 
without  cracking  a  smile,  flung  Dudley  a  cent,  which  he 
put  in  his  pocket  and  carried  for  many  a  long  day. 

"  We  went  to  '  Sharon  '  *  together;  and  so  I  heard  there 
his  first  expounding.  I  must  say  that,  beyond  the  fact 
that  all  the  people  were  devoted  to  him  and  admired 
him  greatly,  I  have  no  recollection  of  his  addresses.  I 
do  not  think  he  would  care  to  have  had  them 
published. 

"  Dudley  was  very  fond  of  singing,  and  such  exercise 
was  often  carried  on  in  his  room,  where  we  all  delighted 
to  congregate.  By  such  gatherings  his  supremacy  was 

1  It  was  the  admirable  custom,  at  the  Virginia  Seminary,  to  assign 
the  students  to  "  Mission  Stations,"  at  a  convenient  distance — vary- 
ing from  two  to  five  miles — from  the  seminary,  and  "  Sharon  "  was 
one  of  these.  Here  the  students  conducted  services  accompanied 
by  brief  addresses.  It  was  at  Sharon  that  Phillips  Brooks  began  his 
lay  ministry. — H.  C.  P. 


Bisbop  SJufcleg  175 

quietly  and  firmly  established,  though  I  am  sure  that  no 
one  ever  saw  a  more  unpretending  and  genial  ruler.  He 
used  to  take  part  in  our  games — in  those  days,  baseball 
— though,  owing  to  his  disabled  arm,  he  was  somewhat 
hindered. 

"  I  don't  think  any  of  us  were  particularly  hard 
students  in  those  days,  though  Dudley  did  wrestle  with 
Hebrew,  and  was  Dr.  Packard's  delight  in  Greek.  His 
great  profit  was  from  Dr.  Sparrow, — in  public  and 
private." 

It  would  be  easy  to  infer  from  these  recol- 
lections that  the  late  Bishop  of  Kentucky 
was  only,  or  mainly,  a  kindly,  good-natured, 
pleasant-mannered  person,  who  took  up  the 
tasks  of  his  great  office  with  an  easy-going 
and  rather  superficial  view  of  their  nature  and 
opportunities,  and  who  neither  by  scholarship 
nor  episcopal  foresight  greatly  magnified  his 
calling.  But  nothing  could  be  more  remote 
from  the  fact.  Men  are  by  temperament,  in- 
tellectually, and  morally,  what  they  are ;  and 
no  one  has  the  moral  without  the  intellectual 
temperament  that  goes  with  it.  Bishop  Dudley 
had  a  kindly  and  sunny  disposition,  and  easy 
and  unpretentious  manners.  But,  in  the  highest 
sense  of  that  word,  he  was  a  scholar  ; — not  a 
mass  of  undigested  learning,  which  dominated 
and  tyrannised  him  ;  but  a  man  to  whom  exact 
knowledge  had  its  legitimate  value,  and  who 


1 76  JSisbop  JDuMeg 

was  competent,  as  his  companions  in  the  work  of 
preparing  the  recently  authorised  version  of 
the  Bible  with  Marginal  Readings  could  testify, 
to  have  an  opinion  upon  hermeneutical  and 
exegetical  questions  based  upon  adequate 
study  and  enquiry. 

And  so  of  his  character  as  a  ruler  and  ad- 
ministrator. He  had  no  swift  contempt  for 
'the  men  or  the  traditions  that  had  gone  before 
him ;  and  his  tender  reverence  for  the  teachers 
and  pastors  at  whose  feet,  in  his  youth,  he 
had  sat,  was  one  of  the  most  winning  and  en- 
gaging traits  of  his  maturer  years.  But  he 
recognised  the  office  of  the  episcopate  as 
called  to  be  taught  supremely  by  the  Holy 
Ghost,  and  he  realised  with  a  trustful  and  be- 
lieving candour  that  it  would  often  happen  that 
new  emergencies  in  the  Church  must  be  met 
by  men  and  methods  adapted  to  them.  He 
was  no  Bourbon  crying  out,  for  ever,  "  The 
past  is  better  ! "  though  the  lessons  of  that  past 
were  never  absent  from  his  mind. 

In  a  word,  he  was  a  man  of  large  vision,  and 
rare  intellectual  endowments.  To  whatever 
task  or  place  he  was  called  in  the  Church,  he 
rose  easily  and  competently  ;  and  when  he  was 
chosen  chairman  of  the  House  of  Bishops, 
which  office  he  held  at  the  time  of  his  death, 


Bisbop  Bufcles  177 

those  who  voted  for  him,  some  of  them,  mainly 
because  he  was  the  bishop  of  a  small  and  cen- 
tral diocese,  whose  place  and  claims  gave  him 
leisure  and  contacts  which  were  desirable, — 
were  agreeably  surprised  to  find  him  illustrate 
as  a  presiding  officer  an  ability  of  the  highest 
order. 

But  through  all  these  various  honours,  dig- 
nities, and  responsibilities,  he  remained  himself 
—simple,  benign,  playful,  sympathetic,  and 
unspoiled. 

It  is  with  such  a  portraiture  of  him  that  I 
close  this  sketch.  It  is  from  the  hand  of  the 
Rev.  R.  Grattan  Noland,  who  knew  him  in- 
timately, and  served  under  him  with  un- 
swerving love  and  loyalty  until  his  removal 
from  the  diocese  of  Kentucky. 

"  My  boyhood  was  spent  in  the  home  of  Bishop  Dud- 
ley's parents-in-law.  My  first  recollection  of  anything 
connected  with  his  election  is  hearing  the  matter  of 
his  election  discussed,  and  receiving  the  impression 
that  he  had  accepted  the  election  to  be  Bishop  of  Ken- 
tucky, partly  at  least,  in  fear  that  otherwise  he  might  be 
called  to  be  a  missionary  bishop. 

"  I  now  doubt  that  he  could  have  been  more  useful 
anywhere  than  in  Kentucky.  For  those  were  somewhat 
perturbed  days  for  the  Church  in  Kentucky,  and  another 
sort  of  man  might  easily  have  emphasised  differences 
existing  in  that  diocese.  Oil  was  surely  needed  on 
those  troubled  waters;  and  Bishop  Dudley  had  a  good 


178  JSfsbop 

deal  of  oil  in  the  castor.  I  doubt  that  he  ever  left  any 
troubled  waters  in  the  wake  of  his  influence. 

"  Rumour  has  it  that  when  the  young  assistant  bishop, 
soon  after  his  consecration,  arrived  in  Kentucky,  some 
one,  determined  to  have  '  a  line  upon '  him  and  his 
policy,  asked  him  whether  he  were  '  high  '  or  '  low  ';  to 
which  he  replied,  '  Sir,  I  am  high,  low,  Jack,  and  the 
game.'  I  have  never  been  able  to  discover  whether  or 
not  this  incident  really  happened;  my  private  opinion  is 
that  it  just  'growed.'  Among  a  people  who  (like  the 
Kentuckians)  are  conversant  with '  Jacks '  and  '  games,'  it 
was  very  easily  possible  for  such  an  estimate  to  be 
placed  upon  Bishop  Dudley.  St.  Paul  (or  even  the 
bishop)  might  have  expressed  it  otherwise  ;  but  the 
people  of  Kentucky  have  ways  of  their  own  ;  and  I  sus- 
pect that  they  just  naturally  and  instinctively  '  sized  up  ' 
the  young  bishop  (who  in  large  degree  was  'all  things  to 
all  men ')  in  these  terms  of  their  own  experience.  But 
whether  it  be  considered  as  the  bishop's  own  declaration 
of  his  policy,  or  as  the  people's  instinctive  estimate  of 
him,  it  was  a  decided  hit.  It  just  covered  the  ground 
of  his  relations,  social  and  ecclesiastical,  with  the  people 
— all  the  people. 

"  He  was  peculiarly  adapted  to  be  *  high,  low,  Jack, 
and  the  game,'  with  the  Kentuckians;  and  he  had,  too,  a 
remarkable  power  of  adapting  himself.  Somehow  it 
just  was  in  him  to  be  en  rapport  with  any  set  of  people 
he  came  in  contact  with.  With  a  splendid  measure  of 
magnetism,  and  glowing  eloquence,  a  large  fund  of 
humour  and  anecdote,  a  wide  acquaintance  with  men  and 
things,  a  marvellous  memory  for  names  and  faces,  a  most 
charming  way  of  meeting  one  half-way  in  entertaining 
and  being  entertained,  and  withal  a  very  sound  judg- 


JBtsbop  H>ufcle£  179 

ment  and  large  charity,  he  at  once  won  his  way,  and 
became  permanently  popular  not  only  within  the  Church, 
but  also  among  all  the  denominations.  If  he  could  not 
quite  say  of  the '  Campbellites,'  who  (like  the  fish,  probably 
named  after  them,  the  '  new  lights ')  were  quite  abun- 
dant in  Kentucky,  that  they,  with  him,  belonged  to  the 
'  army  '  of  the  Lord,  he  could  at  least  say  and  feel  that 
they  belonged  to  the  '  navy.'  It  wasn't  '  policy  '  in  him 
that  he  got  next  to  all  sorts  and  conditions  of  men;  I 
doubt  that,  strictly  speaking,  he  had  much  'policy.'  It 
was  just  instinctive,  natural — a  part  of  himself.  In  the 
later  years  of  his  episcopate,  his  wider  interests  in  the 
larger  problems  and  duties  of  the  Church  divorced  him 
somewhat  from  this  close  touch  with  the  common  run  of 
men  and  women  in  Kentucky;  but  up  to  the  very  last 
the  smallest  of  us  felt  that  it  was  a  delight  to  be  in  the 
bishop's  company — a  delight  not  only  because  the  bishop 
was  always  interesting  and  entertaining,  but  also  because 
he  had  a  way  of  making  us  little  fellows  feel  that  we,  too, 
were  interesting  and  entertaining.  The  fact  of  the  mat- 
ter is,  that,  with  just  half  a  chance,  the  bishop  loved  men 
and  men  loved  him. 

"  I  never  saw  him  really  self-absorbed,  in  the  dumps, 
glum.  He  was  always  awake  to  the  environment;  he  was 
always  interested  in  what  you  were  saying,  or  interesting 
you  in  what  he  was  saying.  He  had  no  episcopal  shell 
into  which  he  withdrew  himself — at  least  not  when  others 
were  around.  His  clergy  knew  him  and  enjoyed  him; 
and  he  knew  and  enjoyed  them.  We  never  dreaded 
him,  or  sought  to  get  away  from  him;  we  always  enjoyed 
him  and  wanted  to  be  with  him.  Once  he  travelled 
some  distance  with  a  'drummer'  (as  the  commercial 
traveller  was  once  called).  They  talked  and  talked, 


i8o 


each  enjoying  the  other.  After  a  while  the  drummer 
asked,  '  What  house  do  you  represent,  sir  ?  '  And  the 
bishop  replied,  '  I  represent  the  House  of  the  Lord;  I  am 
the  Bishop  of  Kentucky.'  And  still  they  talked  on,  the 
drummer  somehow  feeling  that  the  bishop  was  a  sort  of 
drummer,  and  the  bishop  feeling  that  the  drummer  was 
somehow  a  sort  of  bishop.  He  had  a  knack  of  making 
one  feel  that  way.  We  parsons  always  had  a  sort  of 
notion  that  the  bishop  was  a  parson,  too. 

"  His  powers  of  adaptation  were  marvellous.  No  man, 
more  than  he,  liked  the  best;  yet  he  always  managed  to 
get  along  quite  merrily  with  the  worst.  When  it  first 
fell  to  my  happy  lot  to  have  him  come  to  my  parish  for 
a  visitation,  I  nearly  went  broke  for  a  split-box  of  very 
good  cigars;  but  he  would  not  touch  them  ;  he  just 
wanted  a  '  stogie  '  or  a  pipe,  every  time.  Coming  back 
from  the  General  Convention  at  San  Francisco  he  was 
as  near  to  a  bad  humour  as  he  generally  got.  He  was 
very  tired  and  '  tuckered  out,'  and  the  trip  was  very 
mean.  He  complained  of  several  and  varied  assortments 
of  maladies,  and  was  in  fact  greatly  in  need  of  coddling 
and  nursing.  He  had  plenty  of  good  cigars,  and  I  tried 
to  tickle  his  palate  with  one  or  two  other  brands  of  the 
best.  But  it  would  not  go  at  all;  it  was  always,  '  Give 
me  one  of  those  miserable  little  "  stogies  "  of  yours.' 
I  've  often  wondered  if  he  didn  't  just  want  to  be  com- 
rades with  me.  Somehow  I  don't  think  he  could  resist 
that  feeling  —  just  to  be  what  the  other  fellow  was,  pro- 
vided the  other  fellow  was  clean  and  true.  He  was 
himself  singularly  clean  and  true.  I  do  not  remember 
ever  to  have  heard  a  word  of  gossip  or  scandal  from  his 
lips.  Once  or  twice  he  asked  me  about  some  rumour 
that  was  afloat;  but  when  he  found  that  I  had  not 


J3isbop  Hhi&leg  181 

heard  much  about  it,  and  wanted  to  know  the  full  of  it, 
he  shut  up  like  a  clam.  I  doubt  that  any  parson  ever 
got  from  him  the  tale  of  another  parson's  doings.  Yet 
barring  gossip  and  lengthy  argument — he  had  no  taste  for 
arguing  things — the  bishop  was  '  right  in  '  any  little  '  pow- 
wow '  we  had — as  full  of  news  and  fun  and  anecdote  as 
possible.  He  would  sit  by  the  hour,  after  service,  and 
talk  and  listen  so  that  we  all,  at  least,  would  be  sorry  when 
bedtime  came.  I  remember  a  convocation  we  had  up  at 
Beattyville.  Lockwood  was  then  in  charge  of  that  mission 
and  had  things  booming.  Penick,  and  Ward,  and  Sneed, 
and  McCready,  and  Sheppard,  and  I — perhaps  others — 
had  jogged  over  the  mountains  with  the  bishop.  But, 
even  after  the  service  that  night,  none  of  us — not  even 
the  bishop — seemed  tired.  We  were  gathered  about  a 
fire  in  Lockwood's  study,  just  talking  about  all  sorts  of 
things  in  a  rambling  sort  of  way,  and  incidentally  smok- 
ing. Sneed  had  the  floor,  and  was  telling  some  yarn 
about  the  Rockies.  We  were  all  half  listening  and  half 
dozing,  when  Sneed's  hero  somehow  got  mixed  up  with 
a  grizzly.  In  a  most  innocent  way  Sneed  turned  to  the 
bishop  and  impressively  said,  '  And  you  know,  Bishop,  a 
grizzly  is  a  right  dangerous  sort  of  thing.'  I  think  you 
could  have  heard  the  bishop  laugh  at  a  distance  of  six 
blocks.  He  just  doubled  up  and  roared  until  he  cried. 
Somehow  it  is  worth  so  much  in  a  parson's  life  just  to  have 
a  bishop  who  can  laugh  that  way.  It  was  all  a  part  of 
that  work  that  has  been  going  on  in  Kentucky  through- 
out his  episcopate — this  real  enjoyment  and  sense  of 
comradeship  which  we  all  had  in  the  bishop.  It  helped 
to  make  everything  go  so  smoothly,  without  discord  and 
jealousy  or  the  blues.  So  he  was  '  high,  low,  Jack,  and 
the  game.' 


182  Btsbop  H)uMeB 

"  But  he  was  more  than  this.  The  story  is  told  of  an 
old  colored  woman,  who,  having  heard  very  much  of 
the  bishop,  was  anxious  to  inspect  him  at  close  range, 
and  who  (upon  occasion  of  one  of  his  visits)  had  been 
permitted  to  serve  him  with  a  late  breakfast,  and  partic- 
ularly cautioned  to  see  to  it  that  he  had  an  abundance  of 
hot  cakes.  After  several  rounds  of  hot  cakes,  the  bishop 
had  fallen,  over  his  breakfast  (the  breakfast  being  nearly 
over),  into  a  brown  study.  The  old  lady  had  some  diffi- 
culty in  attracting  his  attention  to  another  plate  of 
cakes,  and  presently,  despairing  of  decorous  silence, 
touched  him  and  asked, '  King  Dudley,  will  you  have  some 
cakes  ? '  To  many  of  the  '  colored  '  he  was  indeed  half  a 
king.  The  bishop  had  a  great  fondness  for  the  'colored 
folks.'  I  think  it  was  probably  this  same  old  lady  who 
had  dubbed  him '  king  '  of  whom  he  once  told  me.  The 
Methodists  were  holding  a  colored  revival  in  the  town, 
and  there  was  much  excitement.  One  of  the  preachers 
was  a  very  large  man,  and  the  other  very  small.  The 
bishop  met '  Aunt  Martha '  bustling  about  the  house  and 
asked,  '  Well,  Aunt  Martha,  which  of  your  preachers  do 
you  like  the  best — the  big,  or  the  little  one  ? '  To  which 
Aunt  Martha  replied, '  Lors,  Bishop,  I  think  I  likes  the 
little  one  the  bestis;  he  strain  hisself  the  most.'  I  think 
the  bishop  enjoyed  very  greatly  that  estimate  of  minis- 
terial effectiveness. 

"  An  old  colored  woman,  who  had  known  him  long, 
stood  at  the  station  in  Louisville  awaiting  the  train  which 
bore  his  body  back  home.  Her  tears  were  profuse;  but 
even  her  sorrow  was  transformed  into  indignant  re- 
proaches, when  the  train  drew  in,  because  they  had  not 
draped  the  engine,  as  she  had  heard  was  done  when 
President  McKinley  died. 


JSisbop  Busies  183 

"  To  others,  though  he  was  not  a  '  king,'  he  was  a 
Friend,  writ  very  large.  When  his  body  lay  at  home  in 
Louisville,  there  came  by  night  one — a  gambler,  who 
had  fallen  upon  the  seamy  side  of  life — and  asked  a 
daughter's  permission  to  enter.  '  He  has  never  passed 
me  on  the  street,  Miss  ,'  he  said,  'without  a  Hello 

— ,  a  kind  shake  of  the  hand,  and  a  God  bless  you,  my 

boy.  I  felt  that  you,  Miss ,  would  let  me  come  in 

and  see  him  just  once  more.'  'T  was  so;  and  he,  too, 
wept  beside  the  friend  who  was  gone. 

"  Many  years  ago  in  a  little  hamlet  of  the  mountains, 
the  bishop  stood  by  the  roadside  watching  a  fine  horse 
ridden  by.  Opposite  was  a  blacksmith  shop;  and  pre- 
sently there  emerged  from  the  smithy  a  strapping  fellow, 
begrimed  and  be-aproned,  who  walked  over  and  said, 
'  They  tell  me  that  you  'se  the  Bishop  of  Kaintuckee.  I 
don't  know  nothin'  'bout  what  that  may  be;  but  I  seen 
you  alookin'  at  that  hoss,  and  I  wants  to  shake.'  The 
bishop  shook,  and  had  a  chat.  He  took  supper  that 
night  with  his  new  friend  ;  and  after  a  while  baptised 
and  confirmed  him  and  his  household.  Some  years 
later, — I  think  during  a  session  of  the  Diocesan  Council, 
— a  telegram  from  the  warden  of  the  mission  back  there 
in  the  mountains  was  handed  the  bishop.  It  said  that 
his  friend  the  blacksmith  had  died  the  night  before,  and 
that  his  last  words  were  'tell  the  bishop  that  I  love 
him.' 

"  Up  in  that  mountain  village,  which  he  loved,  stands  a 
pretty  little  stone  church  named  '  St.  Thomas '  in  his 
honour — a  monument  to  one  who  (variously  stated)  was 
bishop, — friend, — king. 

"  In  Bishop  Dudley's  case  the  Lord  had  certainly  re- 
sponded quite  generously  to  that  petition  of  the  Litany 


1 84  JStsbop  £>uMeg 

which  the  lay  reader  got  tangled  up  in — 'That  it  may 
please  thee,  to  illuminate  all  bishops,  priests,  and 
deacons,  so  that  in  due  time  we  may  enjoy  them.' 

"  I  suppose  the  '  fatted  calf '  is  usually  killed  for 
bishops,  even  though  they  be  not  all  prodigals.  But 
Bishop  Dudley  could  make  a  pretty  stiff  bluff  at  '  hog 
and  hominy,'  if  the  host  had  no  fatted  calf  to  kill.  He 
enjoyed  his  meals, — or  at  least  made  you  think  so, — and 
at  table  he  was  himself  always  enjoyable  and  an  appe- 
tiser. He  tells  the  story  of  a  dining-room  servant,  whose 
mistress  had  expressly  commanded  that  hot  waffles  should 
be  in  plenty  for  the  bishop's  breakfast.  After  several 
innings,  there  was  a  pause,  and  the  waiter  stood  back 
stiffly  from  his  duties.  When  nods  and  winks,  in  cres- 
cendo, failed  to  bring  response,  the  mistress  said, 
'John,  why  do  you  not  hand  the  bishop  some  waffles?' 
'  Huh,'  responded  John.  'They  ain't  no  mo';  he  done 
had  ten  already.' 

"  The  bishop's  memory  for  names  and  faces  was 
notorious.  I  was  standing  with  him  once  when  a  lady, 
in  widow's  weeds,  walked  up  and  said,  '  Of  course, 
Bishop,  you  do  not  know  me?'  He  hesitated,  I  think 
about  two  seconds  ;  and  then  he  kissed  her,  saying, 
'Well,  don't  I  though?  You  were  one  of  my  girls  in 
Baltimore  twenty  years  ago,  Miss .' 

"  They  say  that  one  day  he  was  walking  down  street 
with  a  friend  and  saw  approaching  him  a  man,  whom  he 
knew,  but  whose  name  had  slipped  him.  He  nudged 
his  friend  and  said, '  Tell  me  quick,  who  is  this  man;  his 
name  has  utterly  gone  from  me.'  Then  the  man  walked 
up  and  spoke.  Immediately  the  bishop  grasped  his 

hand  with  a  '  How  d'  ye  do,  Mr.  ,'  and  had  a  little 

chat,  inquiring  about  various  persons  and  things  with 


185 

which  Mr. was  conversant.  After  they  passed  on, 

the  friend  inquired,  '  How  on  earth  did  you  get  that 
man's  name?'  And  the  bishop  confessed  that  he  had 
seen  the  initials  in  his  hat  when  it  was  doffed.  He  knew 
pretty  much  everybody  (who  was  known)  in  Kentucky; 
and  not  often  did  a  general  or  a  colonel  escape  him. 
But  upon  one  occasion  some  one  was  telling  of  Gen. 
of  Cynthiana.  The  bishop  could  not  get  the  gen- 
eral located.  At  last  he  asked, '  Who  is  this  Gen. ? ' 

The  general  was  described  in  detail.  '  But/  asked  the 
bishop,  '  what  was  he  general  of  ?  I  know  that  man,  but 
I  never  heard  of  his  being  a  general.'  And  the  narrator 
confessed  that  he  had  at  one  time  been  general  ticket 

agent  of  the R.R.,  a  rather  small  railroad,  by  the 

way. 

"  The  Bishop  of  Lexington  keeps  a  list  of  all  the  com- 
municants of  his  diocese,  revised  from  time  to  time. 
One  day  a  discussion  arose  about  a  Mr.  ,  a  com- 
municant, at  Paris.  Bishop  Dudley  insisted  that  there 
was  no  such  'communicant'  at  Paris.  The  Bishop  of 
Lexington  got  down  his  book,  and  lo  !  there  it  was  in 

plain  black,  Mr. ,  a  communicant  in  good  standing. 

But  Bishop  Dudley  still  insisted  that  it  was  a  mistake, 
and  told  the  story  of  a  Jew,  who  had  '  gotten  religion,' 
but  it  was  in  his  -wife's  name.  We  found  out  later  that 

Mr.  of  Paris  was  a  communicant  in  his  wife's 

name. 

"  I  never  knew  the  bishop  to  take  any  liberties  with  the 
Prayer  Book.  On  special  occasions,  of  course,  he  exer- 
cised the  'jus  liturgicum  '  /  but  on  ordinary  occasions  he 
stuck  to  the  'rubrics.'  Once  he  was  up  in  the  mount- 
ains, and,  with  the  missionary  in  charge,  had  had 
rather  a  strenuous  day  of  it,  winding  up,  after  two  ser- 


186  astsbop  H>uDles 

vices  and  much  gadding  about  over  mountain  roads,  at 
-  at  7.30  for  evening  prayer,  sermon,  and  confir- 
mation. It  was  in  the  days  of  the  'permissive  use.' 
Before  going  into  the  chancel,  the  bishop  said,  '  Let 's 

have  the  shortened  form  to-night.'  And said, 

'  How  's  that,  Bishop  ?'  (he  was  not  yet  conversant  with 
the  '  permissive  use  ').  The  bishop  explained  that  after 
the  '  opening  sentences  '  we  were  permitted  to  say,  '  Let 
us  humbly  confess  our  sins  unto  Almighty  God,'  etc. 

After  the  '  Processional,' read, '  The  Lord  is  in  His 

holy  temple  ;  let  all  the  earth  keep  silence  before  Him,' 
and  then  (as  though  he  had  just  discovered  a  '  mare's 
nest ')  turned  to  the  congregation  and  with  a  voice  full 
of  exultation  said,  '  We  are  permitted  to  say,  let  us 
humbly  confess  our  sins  unto  Almighty  God.'  The 
bishop  was  immensely  refreshed  ! 

"  The  bishop  was  not  much  of  a  hand  at  '  butting 
into  '  things  to  settle  them  by  his  episcopal  authority. 
In  one  of  my  parishes  quite  a  disturbance  had  been 
brewed  over  a  new  organ.  It  waxed  warmer  and 
warmer,  until  I  thought  it  would  get  the  better  of  me. 
But  the  bishop  never  said  a  word,  until  the  occasion  of 
his  visitation.  After  the  services  that  night,  the  congre- 
gation gathered  about  him  in  the  body  of  the  church, 
and  some  one  pointed  out  the  new  organ  as  the  bone  of 
contention.  The  bishop  turned  and  looked  at  the  organ 
and  exclaimed,  'What!  that  little  box  of  whistles! '  And 
the  organ  question  was  settled. 

"  In  another  one  of  my  parishes,  we  had  a  '  row  '  with 
a  mission  started  by  the  parish,  and  now — desirous  of 
becoming  independent — on  the  property  of,  and  so 
much  per  year  from,  the  parish.  There  was  much 
correspondence  between  the  mission  and  parish,  and 


Bfsbop  ZUiMeg  187 

things  were  getting  ugly.  At  last  the  mission  appealed 
to  the  bishop,  and  the  bishop  gave  me  quite  a  scolding, 
— a  sort  of  curtain  lecture.  I  had  an  overweening 
anxiety  to  give  the  other  fellows  rope,  so  I  didn't  say 
very  much.  The  bishop  did  not  officially  interfere, 
though  the  affair  was  considerably  aired  in  the  papers  ; 
only  now  and  then  he  would  give  it  to  me  privately.  At 
last  I  got  tired  of  it,  and  made  a  copy  of  all  the  corre- 
spondence, duly  certified  before  a  notary  ;  and  went 
down  to  visit  the  bishop.  When  he  got  me  by  myself 
he  began  on  me  again.  I  asked,  '  Why  do  you  not  come 
up  and  investigate  this  matter  officially  ?  '  '  Because, 
sir,'  he  said,  '  that  would  bring  the  fuss  officially  before 
the  public,  and  I  want  none  of  that.  But  you  can  settle 
this  matter  yourself,  and  why  do  you  continue  to  permit 
that  little  mission  to  be  dealt  with  so  ungenerously  ? '  I 
handed  him  the  certified  copy  of  the  correspondence  and 
asked  him  to  read  it.  After  reading  he  got  up  and, 

looking  straight  at  me,  said,  ' ,  somebody  has  lied; 

and  I  thank  God  it  is  n't  you.'  He  did  n't  take  the  mat- 
ter up  officially,  but  somehow  the  '  row '  quieted  down 
at  once. 

"  There  were  two  parsons  in  his  diocese  whom  he 
had  a  special  right,  perhaps,  to  scold.  One  night,  after 
some  function  in  the  house,  we,  bed-fellows  on  the  third 
floor,  entered  into  a  collusion  to  have  it  out  with  his 
*  lordship'  the  next  morning.  We  were  just  tired  of 
being  treated  as  though  we  were  still  '  kids,'  and  were  de  • 
termined  that,  before  another  day  passed,  he  should 
understand  that  we  were  men  arid  priests.  Somehow 
the  next  morning  we  were  so  enamoured  of  being  '  still 
kids '  with  the  bishop,  that  we  just  forgot  to  remind  him 
that  we  were  men  and  priests  ; — the  fact  is  that  he  half 


1 88  JSlsbxrp  IDuMes 

made  us  feel  that  we  were  members  of  the  House  of 
Bishops.  He  had  that  way,  somehow.  I  've  known  of 
several  persons  who  were  '  miffed '  at  the  bishop,  and 
got  over  it  without  an  apology  from  him  ;  and  I  have 
never  known  a  single  person,  who  really  knew  him, 
who  stayed  '  miffed  '  at  anything  that  he  happened  to  do. 

"While  he  was  at  the  General  Convention  in  San  Fran- 
cisco, the  Louisville  papers  somehow  conceived  the  idea 
that  he  was  to  be  elected  Bishop  of  Long  Island,  and 
debated  the  question  of  his  removal  to  Brooklyn.  Com- 
ing back  on  the  train,  I  asked  him  if  there  were  any 
truth  in  the  report;  and  if  he  had  been  '  sounded '  upon 
the  matter.  I  found  him  rather  interested,  though  he 
seemed  to  have  no  '  tip '  on  the  whole  subject.  If  the 
rumour  were  true,  he  seemed  to  be  inclined  to  consider  it. 
He  explained  to  me  that  he  was  getting  too  old  for  such 
a  diocese  as  Kentucky,  and  might  be  of  more  use  in  a 
more  compact  diocese;  but  his  chief  interest,  I  gathered, 
lay  in  a  test  of  the  question  of  the  transfer  of  a  diocesan 
bishop.  He  thought  that,  at  his  age,  and  being  chair- 
man of  the  House  of  Bishops,  he  might  put  that  question 
to  the  test  with  dignity.  I  doubt,  however,  that  he 
would  have  done  anything  more  than  merely  feel  the 
pulse  of  the  House  of  Bishops  in  regard  to  the  transfer, 
or  that  he  would  seriously  have  considered  leaving 
Kentucky. 

"  The  bishop  was  never  much  of  a  stickler  for  points. 
I  know  of  no  instance  of  his  endeavouring  to  carry  his 
own  way  by  storm.  He  would  state  his  views,  or  desires, 
or  requests;  and  bolster  them  up  with  his  usually  well- 
considered  reasons;  but,  after  that,  he  would  let  the 
other  side  have  its  say,  and  then  he  would  rest  his  case. 
It  sometimes  seemed  to  me  that  he  was  over-scrupulous 


JStsbop  JDuMes  189 

and  over-sensitive  about  being  perfectly  square  in  push, 
ing  any  enterprise.  I've  never  known  him  in  the  least 
degree  to  descend  to  wire-pulling.  It  was,  I  think,  by 
no  means  his  real  choice  that  the  diocese  should  be 
divided.  In  the  Diocesan  Council  of  1895  ne  proposed 
in  his  address  the  election  of  a  bishop  coadjutor,  and 
offered  to  relinquish  a  portion  of  his  salary  to  make  the 
plan  feasible.  The  matter  was  regularly  and  thoroughly 
discussed.  During  the  discussion,  one  of  the  clergy,  ap- 
pealing for  this  relief  to  the  bishop,  declared,  in  a  fine 
burst  of  eloquence,  that  it  was  but  just  to  our  '  beloved 
bishop,  who  with  such  untiring  diligence  and  faithfulness 
has  ministered  to  us  now  these  1900  years'  (it  was  the 
bishop's  igth  anniversary).  This,  of  course,  brought 
down  the  house.  But  nothing  could  easily  bring  down 

when  he  got  on  his  high  horse  of  eloquence;  and, 

after  a  puzzled  pause,  he  repeated  himself  in  the  iden- 
tical words  a  little  more  impressively.  We  adjourned 
for  luncheon  after  that. 

"But  the  '  resolution '  was  carried;  and  the  standing 
committee  was  instructed  to  ask  consent  to  the  election 
of  a  bishop  coadjutor.  After  the  council  had  adjourned, 
there  arose  some  dispute  concerning  the  methods  used 
in  carrying  the  resolution,  and  there  was  talk  of  '  sharp 
practice.'  I  doubt  that  even  the  silliest  talker  suspected 
for  a  moment  that  the  bishop  had  any  finger  in  this  sup- 
posed 'sharp  practice.'  But  the  mere  word  hurt  the 
bishop;  and  he  at  once  '  withdrew  his  consent.'  The 
project  was  then  started  for  a  division  of  the  diocese. 
After  some  time,  filled  with  gathering  of  statistics  and 
interviews,  a  plan  was  perfected  for  'division,'  which 
was  to  be  discussed  at  a  meeting  of  the  Lexington  con- 
vocation, which  was  practically  coterminous  with  the 


1 90  JStsbop 

present  diocese  of  Lexington.  I  was  assured  that  the 
bishop  had  been  interviewed,  and  that  his  consent 
could  be  had  to  this  project,  if  it  could  be  carried 
through  the  council;  in  fact,  I  was  assured  that  the 
bishop  '  wanted'  this.  But,  despite  all  assurances,  1  had 
an  idea  that  '  division '  was  very  decidedly  the  bishop's 
second  choice,  and  that  he  only  '  wanted  '  it  if  the  other 
alternative, '  the  coadjutor,'  was  out  of  the  question.  On 
my  way  to  the  convocation,  I  took  occasion  to  spend  the 
night  at  the  bishop's,  where  some  of  my  relatives  were 
staying.  I  discovered  that  the  bishop  had,  in  interviews 
with  several  of  the  clergy  of  the  Lexington  convocation, 
expressed  a  willingness  to  have  the  proposed  plan  of 
division  put  to  the  test,  promising  his  canonical  consent 
if  the  plan  proved  feasible.  Then  I  pulled  out  of  my 
pocket  a  paper,  which  I  had  prepared,  the  gist  of  which 
was  a  '  resolution  '  calling  upon  the  standing  committee 
to  execute  the  order  of  the  council  in  the  matter  of  the 
coadjutor,  and  told  the  bishop  that  I  proposed  to  offer 
that  at  the  meeting  of  the  convocation.  Immediately 

he  turned  on  me  pretty  sharply  and  said,  ' ,  don't 

you  know,  sir,  that  I  have  withdrawn  my  consent  to  the 
election  of  a  bishop  coadjutor?'  In  reply  I  stated  the 
facts:  he  had  formally  come  before  the  council  with  a 
proposal — almost  a  request — for  the  election  of  a  coad- 
jutor ;  he  had  formally  given  his  canonical  consent ;  the 
council  had  formally  acted  and  formally  instructed  the 
standing  committee  to  execute  its  desire  in  the  matter. 
'  Is  this  a  matter,'  I  asked, '  which  is  any  longer  in  your 
hands  ?  Can  you,  after  this  action,  withdraw  your  con- 
sent ? '  I  may  be  mistaken  :  it  is  sometimes  difficult  to 
judge  men  by  their  faces  ;  but  the  bishop  had  a  rather 
expressive  face ;  and  I  think  I  read  there  a  feeling  of 


JSisbop  JDufcleg  191 

relief, — a  feeling  as  of  one  who  saw  a  way  out.     At  any 

rate,  the  bishop  said,  ' ,  you  are  right ;  I  have  acted 

ultra  vires  j  I  shall  so  notify  the  standing  committee. 
Then  I  sat  there  in  the  bishop's  study,  and  re-wrote,  at 
his  dictation,   the  preamble   and  resolution,  which  the 
next   day    I    gave   notice   to   the  convocation   I   would 
present  on  the  following  morning. 

"  The  bishop  was  to  go  to  the  convocation.  But  I 
did  n't  want  to  seem  to  be  in  collusion  with  him  in  this 
matter — indeed  I  wasn't;  I  had  evolved  this  whole 
brilliant  scheme  out  of  my  own  head  ;  and  I  and  my 
parish  were  more  radically  opposed  to  '  division  '  than 
the  bishop.  But  when  a  youngster  happens  once  in  a 
while  to  do  what  he  thinks  is  a  smart  thing,  he  is 
apt  to  lay  it  on  pretty  thick  ;  and  I  just  then 
grew  '  wondrous  wise.'  The  bishop  had  a  slight  cold. 
In  the  house  was  the  bishop's  father-in-law,  my 
uncle,  a  doctor.  I  went  off  to  the  doctor's  room,  and 
laid  the  whole  scheme  I  had  hatched  before  him.  The 
upshot  of  it  was  that  a  telegram  was  sent  to  the  Lexing- 
ton convocation  saying  that  the  doctor  forbade  the 
bishop  to  leave  his  house  for  a  day  or  two.  Alas!  had 
the  bishop  been  there,  another  story  might  have  been 
told.  I  gave  notice  that  I  had  a  resolution  of  some  im- 
portance which  I  would  present  the  following  morning; 
and  as  I  didn't  want  to  take  snap-judgment  upon  the 
convocation,  I  would  place  it  in  the  hands  of  the  secre- 
tary, and  ask  the  privilege  of  bringing  it  up,  and  making 
some  explanatory  remarks  upon  it  at  10  o'clock  in  the 
morning.  When  the  morning  came  I  arose  to  call  up  my 
'  resolution,'  and  began  my  remarks,  when  lo  !  a  brother 
arose  and  moved  to  lay  the  '  resolution  '  on  the  table,  de- 
claring that  he  personally  had  interviewed  the  bishop  and 


192  JSisbop  S)uMc\? 

that  the  bishop  'wanted*  the  other  thing;  so  also  said 
several  others.  I  begged  for  just  a  word  of  explanation, 
but  was  '  rapped '  down  and  cried  down.  In  sitting 
down  I  managed  to  yell  out,  '  The  bishop  wants  this,' 
which  cost  me  for  several  months  the  friendship  of  three 
parsons.  My  resolution — even  unread  and  unexplained 
— was  tabled  and  I  was  sat  on  harder  than  at  any  other 
time  in  my  life.  Ah  !  had  the  bishop  only  not  had  a 
cold  !  The  diocese  was  practically  divided  that  day  in 
the  Lexington  convocation, — and,  poor  me,  I  was  not 
even  permitted  to  'peep.'  Once  before,  I  believe,  an 
ass  opened  his  mouth;  and  the  Lord's  way  prevailed  !  " 


Hrcbbtebop  Gait        Hrcbbisbop  Benson 
Hrcbbisbop  temple 


193 


XI 

Hrcbbisbop  £ait      Hrcbbisbop  Benson 
Hrcbbisbop  temple 

RECOLLECTIONS    OF    THREE    ARCHBISHOPS 

THIS  volume  was  undertaken,  as  its  pre- 
face indicates,  to  recall  a  few  American 
bishops,  chiefly  identified  with  the  history  of 
the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century ;  and 
nothing  would  at  first  view  seem  more  remote 
from  its  purpose  than  a  retrospect  which 
crossed  the  Atlantic. 

But,  in  truth,  that  retrospect  would  be  sig- 
nally incomplete  if  it  did  not  recognise  the 
paternal  and  increasingly  felicitous  relation 
which,  during  the  period  that  I  have  desig- 
nated, grew  into  benign  and  affectionate  exist- 
ence between  British  and  American  prelates. 

"  Grew,"  I  have  said,  and  that  word  de- 
scribes, with  sufficient  exactness,  precisely  what 
came  to  pass.  It  cannot  be  pretended  that,  in 

195 


196     "Recollections  of  ftbree  Brcbbisbops 

the  beginning,  there  was,  on  the  one  side  or 
the  other,  any  very  keen  or  tender  interest. 
The  succession  of  bishops  in  the  United  States 
came,  originally,  from  two  sources,  one  of  them 
Scottish,  and  the  other  Anglican.  The  United 
States  of  the  present  were  originally  British 
colonies  ;  and  when  those  colonies  broke  the 
tie  that  had  originally  bound  them  to  their 
mother,  the  ecclesiastics  of  the  mother  Church 
did  not  feel  any  especial  tenderness  toward 
"wayward  children."  and  the  "wayward  child- 
ren "  were,  in  the  new  United  States,  like  the 
early  Christians,  a  "despised  sect,  everywhere 
spoken  against." 

When,  therefore,  it  became  evident  that,  if 
the  Church  in  America  was  to  survive,  it  must 
have  bishops  of  its  own,  an  effort  was  made  to 
obtain  them  from  England.  But  the  Church 
in  England  was  established, — fast  bound  to 
the  State  by  many  and  intimate  ties ;  and  the 
problem,  in  London,  of  giving  consecration  to 
American  bishops  whose  civil  obligations  con- 
strained them  to  disown  the  authority  of  the 
British  Crown,  was  not  an  easy  one.  I  may 
not  here  rehearse  the  story  of  their  Anglican 
failures  ;  but  it  was  not  unnatural  that  these 
should  have  led  Churchmen  in  Connecticut  to 
turn  to  their  Scottish  brethren,  who,  like  their 


"Recollections  of  Ubree  Brcbbisbops    197 

brethren  in  America,  had  become  dissevered 
from  the  State,  and  yet  had  conserved  the 
primitive  and  Apostolic  order,  doctrine,  and 
worship  of  the  Church  of  England. 

To  this  end,  a  convention  of  the  clergy  and 
laity  in  what  is  now  the  Diocese  of  Connecti- 
cut, in  the  year  1784,  chose  Dr.  Samuel 
Seabury  to  be  consecrated  bishop,  and  sent 
him,  for  that  purpose,  with  appropriate  and 
sufficient  testimonials,  to  Aberdeen.  Dr.  Sea- 
bury  was  duly  consecrated  by  the  Primus  of 
Scotland,  the  Bishop  of  Aberdeen  (Kilgour)  ; 
his  coadjutor  (Skinner)  ;  and  the  Bishop  of 
Moray  and  Ross  (Petrie),  in  the  Bishop's 
Chapel  at  Aberdeen  ;  and,  after  signing  a  con- 
cordat with  the  Church  of  Scotland,  affirming 
the  agreement  of  his  own  branch  of  the  Church 
in  doctrine,  discipline,  and  worship  with  that  of 
the  Church  in  Scotland,  speedily  returned  to 
his  work. 

Meantime,  as  I  have  said,  Churchmen  else- 
where in  the  United  States  were  endeavouring 
to  obtain  the  consecration  of  their  bishops 
from  the  See  of  Canterbury ;  but  the  difficul- 
ties were  grave  and  the  delays  unavoidable ; 
and  it  was  not  until  the  year  1787  that  the 
first  Bishop  of  New  York  (Provoost),  and  the 
first  Bishop  of  Pennsylvania  (White),  were 


igB     "Recollections  of  Ubree  Hrcbbisbops 

consecrated,  on  Sunday,  February  4th,  in 
Lambeth  Chapel  by  the  Archbishop  of 
Canterbury  (Moore)  ;  the  Archbishop  of 
York  (Markham)  ;  the  Bishop  of  Bath  and 
Wells  (Moss),  and  the  Bishop  of  Peter- 
borough (Hinchcliffe).  Later,  Bishop  Pro- 
voost,  of  New  York,  assisted  by  Bishop 
Seabury,  of  Connecticut,  and  Bishop  White, 
of  Pennsylvania,  consecrated  Bishop  Claggett, 
of  Maryland,  thus  uniting  both  lines — English 
and  Scotch — in  the  American  succession,  which 
has  descended  in  unbroken  stream  to  the 
present  time. 

But  not,  as  has  been  intimated,  with  any 
special  transatlantic  enthusiasm  in  either  direc- 
tion. Our  American  experiment  did  not 
greatly  interest,  and  could  not  consistently 
attract  Churchmen  who  were  either  Establish- 
mentarians  or  Monarchists — or  both ;  and 
the  American  temper,  sensitive  to  criticism, 
somewhat  inflated  with  the  boundless  self- 
confidence  of  youth,  and  cold  toward  a  mother 
the  generosity  of  whose  earlier  beneficence 
was  easily  forgotten  when  that  beneficence  was 
followed  by  the  silence  of  disapproval,  or 
the  coldness  of  unspoken  distrust, — hardened 
into  a  chronic  reserve. 

Such,  it  must  honestly  be  owned,  was  the 


•Recollections  of  Hbree  Hrcbbisbops     199 

situation  until  the  year  1868;  for,  while  there 
had  been  in  personal  instances  a  cordial  wel- 
come in  Great  Britain  for  individual  American 
bishops,  whose  brilliant  gifts  and  loving  enthu- 
siasm for  their  Anglican  mother  won  for  them 
a  very  warm  place  in  Anglican  hearts  and 
homes,  it  cannot  be  denied  that  the  great 
majority  of  American  Churchmen  regarded 
that  mother  with  avowed  dislike,  or  concealed 
suspicion. 

It  was  given  to  a  Canadian  bishop — unless  I 
have  been  misinformed — to  bring  this  infelici- 
tous state  of  things  to  an  end.  There  are 
others  to  whom  that  honour  has  been  ascribed  ; 
and  it  is  not  at  all  impossible  that  a  great 
thought — for  it  was  a  great  thought — had  been 
seething  in  the  mind  of  more  than  one  cis- 
atlantic bishop,  when  Bishop  Lewis,  of  On- 
tario, later  Archbishop  of  Canada,  suggested  to 
the  then  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  the  Most 
Reverend  Dr.  Longley,  that  he  should  invite 
the  bishops  of  the  Anglican  communion  in 
both  hemispheres  to  meet  at  Lambeth.  They 
did  so  in  the  summer  of  1868;  and  every 
ten  years  thereafter  (except  in  1897,  when  the 
conference  was  arranged  for  that  year  to  coin- 
cide with  Queen  Victoria's  Diamond  Jubilee) 
the  Lambeth  Conference  has  been  held. 


200      "Recollections  of  Hrcbbisbop  ZTait 

When  it  sat  in  1878,  I  was  not  a  member  of 
the  House  of  Bishops ;  and  my  knowledge  of 
the  Conference  was  merely  accidental,  but  it 
brought  me  into  contact  with  the  Archbishop 
of  Canterbury,  the  Most  Reverend  Archibald 
Campbell  Tait,  of  whom,  in  these  recollections 
it  will  be  my  privilege  first  of  all  to  speak. 


THE  MOST  REVEREND  DR.   ARCHIBALD  CAMPBELL 

TAIT,  ARCHBISHOP  OF  CANTERBURY  FROM 

1868  TO   1882 

Archibald  Campbell  Tait — of  Scottish  par- 
entage, as  his  name  very  clearly  indicates — 
was  born  at  Edinburgh  on  December  22, 
1811.  His  school  life  was  mainly  passed 
in  Edinburgh ;  and  it  ought  to  interest 
Americans  that  one  of  the  poems  for  which, 
as  a  pupil  in  the  Edinburgh  Academy,  he 
won  a  prize,  was  a  set  of  Latin  hexameters 
on  "American  Independence."  The  boy  grew 
up  side  by  side  with  a  young  kinsman  whose 
parents  were  Church-people ;  and  when,  later, 
he  won  what  was  known  as  the  "  Snell  Exhib- 
ition," and  went,  on  that  "  Foundation,"  to 
Oxford,  he  became  an  undergraduate  of  the 
University  in  Balliol  College.  It  was  while  at 


uecrtons  of  Hrcbbtsbop  Han 

n  it  s.it  in  1878,  I  was  not  a  member  oi 
•mps  ;  and  my  knowledge  of 
».  merely  accidental,  but  it 
ntaot  with  the  Archbishop 
Most  Reverend  Archibald 
m,  in  these  recollections 
first  of  all  to  speak. 


)  DK.    ARCHIBALD  CAMPBELL 
uij  ul    ("ANTEfcHUFV  FROM 

The  Most  Reverend 
Doctor  Archibald  Campbell  Tait, 

Archbishop  of  Canterburypttish  par- 

From  a  photograph  reproduced  by  permission  of 
Elliott  &  Fry,  London. 

passed 

.  •  • 

*;*<«  one  of  the  poems  for  which, 

«»   the    Edinburgh   Academy,    he 

•  .is  a  set  of  Latin  hexameters 

•^dependence."    The  boy  grew 

•vith  a  young  kinsman  whose 

urch-people;  and  when,  later, 

*h.it  v  a-,  known  as  the  "  Snell  Exhir> 

*ml  went,   ^>n    that   "Foundation,"    to 

became  an   undergraduate  of  the 

•?y  m  Balliol  Coiicee.    It  was  while  at 


•Recollections  of  Hrcbbisbop  Ualt      201 

Oxford  that  he  was  confirmed  by  the  Bishop 
of  Oxford,  of  that  time,  and  a  little  later  won  a 
scholarship  in  Balliol  itself.  On  Trinity  Sun- 
day, 1836,  he  was  ordained  deacon  by  Dr. 
Richard  Bagot,  Bishop  of  Oxford,  and  soon 
after  became  curate  of  March  Baldon,  in  a 
desolate  region  some  five  miles  from  Oxford. 
Years  afterward  when,  as  Bishop  of  London, 
he  instituted  there  some  novel  and  unconven- 
tional places  for  mission  work  among  the  poor, 
he  recalled  the  lessons  he  had  learned,  as  a 
stripling,  in  March  Baldon. 

Tait  remained  a  tutor  in  Oxford  until,  in 
1842,  he  was  chosen  to  succeed  Dr.  Thomas 
Arnold  as  Head  Master  of  Rugby  School.  At 
Rugby  he  spent  seven  years,  and  was  then  ap- 
pointed Dean  of  Carlisle.  The  Rugby  life 
was  an  anxious  and  laborious  one,  and  the 
trepidation  with  which  his  friends  contemplated 
his  attempting  it  is  curiously  illustrated  by  a 
letter  from  one  of  the  most  intimate  of  them, 
Arthur  Penrhyn  Stanley,  afterwards  Dean  of 
Westminster,  which  began,  "  My  dear  Tait,  the 
awful  intelligence  of  your  election  has  just 
reached  me."  In  other  words,  men  who  had 
known  and  worshipped  Arnold  as  Stanley  had, 
looked  with  dismay  upon  the  audacity  of  any 
one  who  should  undertake  to  succeed  him. 


202        (Recollections  ot  Hrcbbisbop  Unit 

Tait,  however,  not  only  made  the  venture,  but, 
though  he  could  never  rival  Arnold,  illustrated 
in  his  work  at  Rugby  some  of  the  noblest 
traits  and  aptitudes  of  his  rare  character. 
Broken  in  health,  and  overwhelmed  by  tasks 
that  were  too  great  for  any  man,  he  turned 
gratefully,  when  the  call  came  to  him,  to  what 
he  and  his  friends  supposed,  at  the  time,  would 
afford  to  him  for  the  rest  of  his  life  the  digni- 
fied repose  of  an  English  deanery.  But  it  soon 
became  evident  to  the  people  of  Carlisle  that 
it  was  to  be  no  merely  dignified  repose  to  him. 
In  the  cathedral,  and  out  of  it,  among  all 
classes  and  ages,  he  made  himself  a  helpful 
and  inspiring  power;  and  when,  in  1856,  he  was 
called  to  be  Bishop  of  London,  he  took  with 
him  to  that  larger  sphere,  not  alone  a  store  of 
experiences,  but  of  developed  powers,  which 
made  him  ideally  fit  for  the  tremendous  tasks  of 
that  see.  It  is  a  familiar  tradition  that  to  that 
lofty  place  in  the  life  of  the  Church  of  England 
he  was  called  by  the  choice  of  the  Queen  ;  and 
that  Victoria's  mother-heart  had  been  drawn  to 
him  by  the  exceptional  bereavement  which, 
through  a  visitation  of  scarlet-fever,  had  taken 
from  him  in  a  month  five  daughters.  I  have 
no  smallest  doubt  that  that  sorrow  won  from 
his  sovereign  the  tenderest  sympathy ;  but  I 


•Recollections  ot  Hrcbbisbop  ftaft       203 

have  as  little  that  she  was  abundantly  certified 
of  his  great  gifts,  and  his  rare  character,  by 
testimony  as  august  as  it  was  competent. 

Never,  indeed,  in  the  history  of  the  Church 
of  England  was  there  an  appointment  to  the 
see  of  London  more  felicitous  and  fit.  It  was 
an  hour  of  transitions, — of  awakenings, — of 
large  and  novel  emergencies.  And,  step  by 
step,  Tait  rose  to  every  one  of  them  with 
steadily  greatening  grasp  and  discernment. 

This  is  not  the  place  to  rehearse  the  evi- 
dence of  this  as  it  was  presented,  e.  g.,  in  his 
masterly  dealings  with  Essays  and  Reviews, 
and  with  the  case  of  Bishop  Colenso.  The 
former  was  the  case  of  a  volume  of  papers  of 
very  unequal  merit  which  antagonised  the 
opinions  of  the  great  majority  of  Anglican 
Churchmen.  The  latter  raised  questions,  both 
dogmatic  and  political,  which  involved  not  only 
a  traditional  view  of  the  Bible,  widely  held, 
but  also  the  matter  of  the  relation  of  Colonial 
sees  to  their  Anglican  mother,  and  the  com- 
petency of  Colonial  metropolitans  to  erect  their 
own  opinions  into  absolute  standards  of  the 
Church's  discipline.  Looking  back  upon  the 
whole  dreary  business,  now,  with  the  fuller 
light  of  a  later  scholarship,  and  with  a  more 
truly  catholic  interpretation  of  the  Church's 


204       "Recollections  of  Hrcbbisbop  Trait 

standards,  there  is  something  sublime  in  the 
quiet  firmness  with  which  the  Bishop  of 
London  defined  and  maintained  his  ground. 
Arrayed  against  him  were  the  great  majority  of 
the  bishops  of  the  hour  ;  and  foremost  among 
these  were  men  who,  like  Samuel  Wilberforce, 
then  of  Oxford,  had  the  popular  ear  as  the 
champions  of  orthodoxy.  But  neither  their 
fierce  and  denunciatory  words,  nor  those  of 
the  Bishop  of  Capetown,  moved  Bishop  Tait 
in  the  smallest  degree.  He  did  not  either  ad- 
mire or  agree  with  Bishop  Colenso,  or  with 
most  of  the  authors  of  Essays  and  Reviews. 
But  he  knew  the  law  of  the  Church,  and  the 
just  limits  in  it  of  freedom  of  speech ;  and  no 
theological  hysterics,  however  violent  or  abus- 
ive, could  avail  to  disturb  or  constrain  him.  He 
stood  his  ground,  and  in  due  time,  the  best 
minds  in  the  Church  owned  that  he  was  right. 
Bishop  Tait  became  Archbishop  of  Canter- 
bury in  1868,  and  it  was  as  such  that  I  first 
knew  him.  His  son  Craufurd,  then  in  orders, 
visited  the  United  States  in  the  year  1877, 
and  charmed  us  all  by  a  quality  which  at 
that  time,  at  any  rate,  was  rare  in  his 
countrymen.  Most  Englishmen,  however  la- 
boriously they  strove  to  conceal  it,  could  not 
quite  hide  their  surprise,  and,  oftener  than 


•Recollections  of  Hrcbbisbop  Trait       205 

otherwise,  their  disapproval,  of  customs  differ- 
ent from  their  own.  They  resented  it  that  an 
American  would  not  say  "  different  to  "  ;  and  it 
was  quite  in  vain  that  one  showed  them  the 
passage  in  the  fifteenth  chapter  of  St.  Paul's 
first  Epistle  to  the  Corinthians,  in  which,  in 
the  English  Bible  and  in  King  James's  ver- 
sion, it  is  said  that  "  One  star  differeth  from 
another  star  in  glory"  (v.  41).  The  Bible 
might  say  what  it  pleased ;  but  English 
custom  said  thus  and  so,  and  that  settled  the 
question.  The  average  English  traveller  could 
not  see  that  what  exasperated  the  American 
was  the  assumption  that  English  usage  settled 
any  question, — that  it  was  not  further  debat- 
able,— and  that  whatever  other  men  or  nations 
might  say  was  a  matter  of  profound  indifference. 
The  charm  of  the  Reverend  Craufurd  Tait 
consisted  in  the  fact  that,  among  other  graces, 
he  had  a  singularly  open  mind  ;  and,  while  he 
did  not  conceal  his  surprise,  or  dissent  from, 
what  was  unfamiliar,  he  had  a  scholar's  curi- 
osity concerning  much  that  must  needs  have 
jarred  upon  his  wonted  traditions,  or  modes  of 
usage.  He  had  a  surprising  aptitude  for 
entering  into  situations  that  were  mentally,  as 
well  as  otherwise,  unfamiliar  to  him  ;  and  he 
had  a  genius  of  swift  appreciation  for  things 


206        "Recollections  of  Hrcbbisbop  TIaft 

which  were  the  product  of  the  needs  of  our 
Western  civilisation,  and  which  Anglican  con- 
servatism had  been  wont  to  regard  with  reserve 
or  suspicion,  which,  to  his  American  hosts,  was 
a  perpetual  delight.  I  was  at  that  time  a  New 
York  rector,  and  he  was  for  a  time  our  guest 
at  the  rectory.  It  was  my  privilege,  as  secre- 
tary of  the  House  of  Bishops,  to  introduce  him 
to  that  body  when,  during  the  General  Con- 
vention of  1877,  the  Presiding  Bishop  invited 
him  to  address  the  House.  The  convention 
sat  in  Boston,  and  everybody  in  that  some- 
what undemonstrative  community  was  as 
swiftly  won  by  him  as  we  had  been  in  New 
York.  He  made  a  brief  address  in  each  of  the 
two  Houses  of  the  convention,  attracting  all 
hearts  by  his  singular  modesty  and  evident 
culture  ;  and  returned,  soon  afterwards,  to 
England.  He  had  not  been  long  at  home 
before  he  fell  ill,  and  in  a  few  months  was  no 
more. 

As  it  happened,  I  was  in  London  in  the 
spring  of  1878  with  two  of  my  children.  I  did 
not  intrude  upon  the  Archbishop  of  Canter- 
bury ;  first,  because  of  his  recent  and  sore 
affliction,  and,  second,  because  the  Lambeth 
Conference  was  then  about  to  assemble,  and 
Lambeth  Palace  was  besieged  by  bishops,  of 


IRecollections  of  Brcbbisbop  Trait       207 

whom  I  was  not  then  one.  But  the  archbishop 
found  me  out  in  my  modest  little  London 
hotel,  and  insisted  that  my  children  and  I 
should  come  and  stay  at  Lambeth.  I  shall 
never  forget  the  morning  of  our  arrival  there. 
My  children  were  shown  at  once  to  their  room, 
and  I  was  conducted  to  the  archbishop's 
study.  It  is  now  nearly  thirty  years  since  I 
then,  for  the  first  time,  saw  him  ;  but  I  re- 
member the  whole  incident  as  though  it  had 
happened  yesterday.  After  a  few  exchanges  of 
greeting  and  enquiry  of  the  usual  sort,  he  said, 
"You  knew  Craufurd  ?  He  stayed  under  your 
roof  ?  "  and  then  rising,  he  walked  to  a  desk, 
nearby,  and  took  from  it  a  photograph  of  his 
son.  Handing  it  to  me  he  said,  "  Does  that 
look  like  him  ?  "  and  as  I  stood  looking  at  the 
bright  young  features,  he  turned  his  back  to 
me,  covered  his  face  with  his  hands,  and  burst 
into  tears. 

I  have  never  seen  emotion  which  so  deeply 
moved  me.  Archbishop  Tait  had  that  about 
him  that  recalled  his  own  Scotch  granite. 
And  to  see  that  stately  figure  and  self- 
contained  prelate  swept  off  his  feet,  as  it  were, 
by  the  strong  tide  of  parental  feeling,  was  a 
sight  never  to  be  forgotten. 

One  other  incident  I  recall  of  that  charming 


208       "Recollections  of  Hrcbbisbop  Trait 

visit,  which  was  equally  individual  and  charac- 
teristic. We  had  come  to  Sunday,  and  I  had 
been  preaching  in  the  morning,  for  a  London 
divine  of  some  eminence  and  of  numerous  doc- 
trinal eccentricities.  At  the  lunch-table,  Mrs. 
Tait,  the  type  of  whose  Churchmanship  was 
much  more  accentuated  than  her  husband's, 
said,  from  her  end  of  the  table,  "  Dr.  Potter, 
where  have  you  been  this  morning  ?  "  "I  have 
been  preaching  for  Mr.  H—  — ,"  I  answered. 

"  Preaching  for  Mr.   H ! "  she  screamed. 

And  then,  calling  out  to  the  archbishop  she 
added,  "  My  dear,  do  you  know  where  Dr. 
Potter  has  been  this  morning?  He  has  been 
preaching  for  Mr.  H-  -  ! "  "  Well,"  said  the 
archbishop,  "  I  am  glad  of  it.  I  hope  he 
preached  the  Gospel ! "  (which,  it  was  gener- 
ally believed,  was  not  often  heard  in  Mr. 

H 's  pulpit),  and  the  incident  was  closed. 

It  was  a  fine  and  characteristic  illustration  of 
a  really  great  nature.     The  archbishop  probably 

liked  Mr.  H ,  and  his  theological  vagaries, 

as  little  as  his  wife  liked  them.  But  he  never 
dignified  such  vagaries  by  attacking  them ; 
and  he  realised  that  American  curiosity  con- 
cerning this  or  any  other  ecclesiastical  oddity 
would  be  less  vigorously  stimulated  by  silence 
than  by  criticism. 


•Recollections  of  Hrcbbisbop  Benson    209 

Archbishop  Tait  has  been  called  a  great 
statesman  rather  than  a  great  ecclesiastic.  He 
was,  in  fact,  a  great  ecclesiastical  statesman  ; 
and  one  shudders  to  think  what  might  have 
befallen  the  Church  in  Great  Britain  if,  in  that 
eventful  era  through  which  he  lived,  he  had  not 
been  given  to  it. 

ii 

THE  MOST  REVEREND  DR.  EDWARD  WHITE 

BENSON,  ARCHBISHOP  OF  CANTERBURY 

FROM  l882  TO  1896 

On  a  morning  early  in  1884  I  had  an  errand 
which  took  me  to  the  designer's  room  in  a 
great  establishment  in  New  York,  the  repu- 
tation of  which  for  artistic  taste  is  world-wide. 
At  the  moment,  the  gentleman  whom  I  had 
called  to  see  was  absent ;  but  on  his  desk  there 
stood  a  sketch,  made  with  rare  skill,  which  at 
once  caught  my  eye.  It  represented  a  lad  clad 
in  an  Eton  cap  and  jacket,  with  light  flowing 
hair,  holding  a  book  under  his  arm,  and  run- 
ning. Underneath  the  picture  was  written, 
"  The  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  as  I  remem- 
ber him."  Presently  there  entered  the  artist 
for  whom  I  was  waiting,  and  pointing  to  the 
picture,  I  said: 


210     "Recollections  of  Hrcbbtsbop  JSenson 

"  What  does  that  mean  ?" 

"Just  what  it  says,"  was  his  answer.  "Ed- 
ward White  Benson,  who  has  just  been  made 
Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  and  I  were  school- 
fellows, at  King  Edward's  School  (the  head 
master  of  which  was  then  the  famous  Prince 
Lee,  afterwards  Bishop  of  Manchester),  in  Bir- 
mingham. Benson's  father  was  a  chemist,  and 
also  an  inventor  and  author,  with  a  rare  enthu- 
siasm for  botany.  The  figure  that  I  have 
sketched  on  yonder  card  "  (it  will  be  found  on 
p.  27  of  Archbishop  Benson's  Life  by  his  son, 
but  without  any  acknowledgment  of  its  source) 
"  was  a  very  familiar  one  in  my  boyhood.  Ben- 
son's way  to  King  Edward's  School  lay  past 
our  door ;  and  often,  when  I  knew  that  / 
should  be  late  to  school,  I  looked  out  of  the 
window  and  saw  '  White  Benson,'  as  we  were 
wont  to  call  him,  running  thither  that  he  might 
not  be." 

The  boy  who  was  a  pupil  in  King  Edward's 
School  in  Birmingham  went  thence,  as  a  sizer,  to 
Cambridge  University,  was  graduated  there  with 
honour,  and  soon  afterwards  was  chosen  to  be  a 
master  at  Rugby  School.  He  illustrated  here 
the  qualities  that  subsequently  on  broader  fields 
found  striking  opportunity ;  and  it  was  not 
surprising  that  when  Wellington  College  was 


210     Recollections  of  HrcbWsbop  Benson 

"What  docs  that  mean  ?" 

"Just  what  it  s.-iys."  was  his  answer.  "Ed- 
ward Whiu-  H«ri»<on,  who  has  just  been  made 
Archbishop  <?'  *  .wterbury,  and  1  were  school- 
fellows J>;OK  Kd  ward's  School  (thf  head 
master  <>;  rf»  uas  then  the  famous  Prince 
Let-.  B;shojy  of  Manchester),  in  Bir- 

miuc'  • '"  ?^on  i>  father  was  a  chemist,  and 

•-..-HIM  and  author,  with  a  rare  enthu- 
-.:  botany.  The  figure  that  I  have 

The  Mos^Reverenti'1 
Doctor  Edward  White  BeriSok;  His 
Archbishop  of  Canterbury.'  ; 

From  a  photograph  reproduced  by  permission  of  ! 

Elliott  &  Fry,  London.      >chool    la)'    |>aSt 

;^u    .i»v>»  .  .*n«i    often,    when    I    knew  that   / 

.sh<»»».  l   be  late  to  school,    i   looked  out  of  the 

!t>w  and  saw  '  White  Benson/  as  we  were 

•  Tit  to  cull  him.  running  thither  that  he  might 

HOl    '"' 

Thf  M>y  who  was  a  pupil  in  King  Edward's 

Sdux>i  HI  Birmingham  went  thence,  asasizer,  to 

r.air.bri.i^'  I   niversity,wasgraduated  there  with 

nsour,  and  soon  afterwards  was  chosen  to  be  a 

..strr  at  Rugby  School.     He  illustrated  here 

i  <•<••  i-j.iilties  that  subsequently  on  broader  fields 

striking  opportunity ;    and    it  was   not 

.:«',.:  that  when  Wellington  College  was 


IRecollecttons  of  Hrcbbisbop  Benson 


211 


founded  for  the  education  of  the  sons  of  mili- 
tary men,  and  as  a  memorial  of  the  great  Duke 
of  Wellington,  he  was  called  to  be  its  first 
head  master.  Some  fifteen  years  of  a  school- 
master's anxious  work  led  him  to  crave  the 
repose  of  a  less  arduous  life;  and  in  1872, 
though  at  large  pecuniary  sacrifice,  he  accepted 
from  Bishop  Christopher  Wordsworth  of  Lin- 
coln an  invitation  to  be  the  chancellor  of  the 
diocese,  with  the  additional  rank  of  canon  in 
the  cathedral.  He  made  his  position  one  of 
various  service  and  influence,  and  revealed 
powers  which,  when,  in  1876,  the  diocese  of 
Truro  was  created  out  of  Exeter,  led  Lord 
Beaconsfield  to  offer  him  that  see.  He  served 
it  with  rare  enthusiasm,  and  with  brilliant  re- 
sults ;  and  when,  in  1882,  Canterbury  became 
vacant,  it  would  not  be  an  exaggeration  to  say 
that  the  best  elements  in  the  Church  of 
England  turned  to  him,  and  hailed  with  wide 
thanksgiving  his  nomination  by  Mr.  Gladstone 
to  the  primacy. 

I  came  to  know  him  six  years  later  when 
the  Lambeth  Conference  of  1888  was  con- 
vened, in  July,  in  the  library  of  Lambeth 
Palace.  He  was  an  admirable  presiding  offi- 
cer, and  a  matchless  host ; — in  the  latter 
respect,  I  think,  altogether  exceptional.  Our 


sis     Recollections  ot  Srcbbisbop  Benson 

English  brethren  illustrate  their  insularity  of 
character  in  nothing  more  amusingly  than  in 
their  bland  assumption  that  the  social  usages, 
hours,  etc.,  of  the  British  Isles  are  those  of 
the  whole  round  world, — known  and  read  of 
all  men,  and  never,  by  any  chance,  to  be  stated 
or  explained,  but  always  and  everywhere  to  be 
taken  for  granted.  A  venerable  American 
bishop  from  one  of  our  Western  States  is  said 
to  have  visited  England,  long  before  the  days 
of  Archbishop  Benson,  and  to  have  been 
asked  by  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  of  that 
time  to  be  a  guest  at  Lambeth  Palace.  The 
bishop  and  his  wife  arrived  late  in  the  after- 
noon, just  as  the  household  was  assembling  in 
the  drawing-room  for  "afternoon  tea."  In 
this  they  were  bidden  to  join ;  and  albeit 
rather  discouraged  by  the  scanty  nature  of  the 
repast, — for  they  had  made  a  long  day's  jour- 
ney and  had  had  nothing  since  a  very  early 
breakfast, — they  ate  as  freely  as  they  were  per- 
mitted of  everything  in  sight.  Then  the 
mistress  of  the  house  rose  and,  without  fur- 
ther explanation,  said,  "  The  servant  will  show 
you  to  your  rooms."  The  bishop  and  his 
wife  were  somewhat  staggered,  for  in  that 
Western  home  from  which  they  came,  tea 
or  "  supper "  was  a  much  heartier  and  some- 


Recollections  of  Hrcbbfsbop  Benson     213 

what  later  meal ;  and,  after  it,  people  did  not 
immediately  retire  ;  but  the  air  of  the  hostess 
was  somewhat  mandatory ;  and  they  meekly 
followed  the  servant  to  their  rooms.  There 
they  sat,  in  one  of  the  windows  looking  out 
upon  the  somewhat  dreary  vision  of  smut  and 
chimney  pots  which  so  widely  saluted  them, 
until  at  length  the  bishop,  looking  at  his  watch, 
said,  "  Well,  my  dear,  I  am  very  tired,  and  I 
think  I  will  go  to  bed."  Proceeding  with 
some  deliberation  to  do  so,  the  episcopal  per- 
son had  just  comfortably  tucked  itself  between 
the  sheets,  when  there  came  a  sharp  rap  at  the 
door.  "  Yes,"  said  the  bishop,  who  was  already 
dozing,  "  what  is  it  ?"  Answered  the  voice  of 
the  butler  from  without,  "  It  is  half-past  eight, 
my  lord,  and  dinner  will  be  on  the  table  in  five 
minutes ! " 

Such  a  thing  could  not  have  happened  in 
Archbishop  Benson's  time.  He  recognised, 
with  a  swift  intuition,  that  the  habits  of  foreign- 
ers, and  the  habits  of  Britons  might  not  be 
identical ;  and  his  household  was  ordered  upon 
a  wise  forethought,  with  abundant  information 
for  every  guest.  Of  course,  it  illustrated  An- 
glican customs ;  but  if  there  were  others,  he 
did  not  resent  them  as  bai  baric  intrusions.  I 
remember  an  evening  at  Lambeth,  when  I  had 


2H    "Recollections  of  Brcbbisbop  JSenson 

the  privilege  of  being  his  guest  there,  which 
illustrates  this.  It  was  during  the  Lambeth 
Conference,  and  when  the  palace  was  full  of 
guests.  The  dinner  had  been  large,  long,  and 
— I  wonder  if  I  may  dare  to  add — dull ;  and  we 
were  gathered  in  the  drawing-room  in  that 
ante-climax  of  the  evening  which  no  one  who 
has  experienced  it  can  very  joyfully  remember. 
At  that  moment  the  present  Archbishop  of 
Canterbury,  who  was  then  the  Dean  of  Wind- 
sor, and  one  of  the  secretaries  of  the  Lambeth 
Conference,  rose  and  said,  in  a  voice  intended  to 
be  heard  by  the  whole  company,  "  Well,  I  fear 
I  must  go  to  my  work  "  ;  and  then,  sotto  voce, 
as  he  passed  my  chair,  "If  you  care  to  come 
to  my  room,  I  will  give  you  a  cigar."  It 
should  be  noted,  here,  that,  at  that  time,  the 
hearts  of  our  British  brethren  had  not  greatly 
softened  to  American  infirmities ;  and  smok- 
ing, in  an  episcopal  palace,  was  regarded  as 
somewhat  profane.  But  I  fear  that  I  followed 
the  Dean  of  Windsor  with  unseemly  eager- 
ness ;  and,  for  an  hour  or  more,  "  burnt  incense 
unto  Baal,"  as  a  good  old  American  bishop 
used  to  describe  it,  with  keen  delight.  It  was 
long  after  midnight  when  I  took  leave  of  the 
dean,  and  set  out  for  my  room.  My  cigar  was 
still  in  my  hand,  and  my  way  lay  through  a 


•Recollections  of  Brcbbisbop  Benson   215 

long,  dark  hall,  at  the  other  end  of  which  were 
the  staircase  and  the  archbishop's  study.  I 
had  nearly  reached  the  former  when,  to  my 
horror,  the  door  of  the  study  was  opened,  and 
his  grace  stood  revealed  in  the  bright  light 
which  streamed  through  it.  There  was  no- 
thing to  be  said,  and  no  avenue  for  retreat. 
Covered  with  dismay,  and  with  the  witness  of 
my  guilt  in  my  fingers,  I  stood  transfixed.  But 
in  a  moment  there  came  the  archbishop's  bub- 
bling "  Ha  !  Ha  !  New  York  !  I  have  caught 
you,  red-handed ! "  and  then,  as  he  passed  on, 
that  kindly  twinkle  of  his  eye,  and  that  radiant 
and  luminous  smile  which  no  one  who  ever  saw 
them  will  forget ! 

Indeed,  it  was  this  genius  of  humour,  and  the 
singular  felicity  of  its  expression,  which  were 
among  Archbishop  Benson's  most  exquisite 
gifts.  He  was  remarkable  for  the  exceptional 
facility  with  which  he  used  his  rare  mastery  of 
the  classics  in  this  connection  ;  and  his  genius 
in  casting  his  phrases  into  some  form  of 
medieval  Latin  was  something  which  I  have 
never  seen  matched.  But,  whether  Latin  or 
English,  it  did  not  matter.  His  rare  charm 
lay  in  that  swift  facility  with  which,  very  often, 
he  redeemed  an  embarrassing  moment  by  some 
playful  term  which  took  all  the  sting  out  of 


216   IRecollecttons  of  Hrcbbisbop  Benson 

acrimonious  words,  or  an  awkward  situation. 
At  the  Lambeth  Conference,  one  of  the  topics 
was  "  Socialism  "  ;  and  one  of  the  speakers  en- 
larged upon  the  vices  of  modern  society  with  a 
good  deal  of  heat ;  dwelling,  I  remember,  with 
especial  bitterness  upon  what  he  called  the 
"  irritating  indulgence  of  display,  by  the  rich, 
as  illustrated  particularly  by  their  '  liveried 
menials.' '  The  phrase  seemed  to  me,  as  I 
caught  it,  somewhat  infelicitous ;  and  I  found 
myself  recalling  the  archbishop's  servants  in 
their  sober  liveries,  and  thinking,  in  view  of 
their  courteous  guidance,  and  our  frequent  ap- 
peals to  them  for  that  guidance — which  we 
should  hardly  have  ventured  to  make  if  we  had 
not  been  enabled,  by  their  dress,  to  identify 
them — I  found  myself  thinking,  I  say,  that  the 
philippic  concerning  "  liveried  menials  "  might 
wisely  have  been  omitted,  or  that,  at  any 
rate,  such  acrid  criticism  of  a  usage  followed 
by  our  gracious  host  might  wisely  have  been 
postponed. 

It  was  while  my  mind  was  occupied  with 
these  reflections  that  the  paper  was  concluded, 
and  the  speaker  sat  down.  The  essay  had  been 
able,  and  the  subject  was  profoundly  interesting. 
But  the  pause  that  followed  its  conclusion  was 
considerable,  and  the  situation  was  awkward. 


•Recollections  of  Hrcbbfsbop  Benson    217 

In  a  moment,  however,  the  silence  was  broken 
by  the  voice  of  the  archbishop,  as  he  drew  his 
watch  from  his  pocket,  and  having  consulted 
it,  turned  toward  us  a  most  genial  face  :  "  It  is 
now  twenty  minutes  after  one,"  he  said,  "  and 
luncheon  is  to  be  served  in  ten  minutes.  No 
adequate  discussion  of  the  admirable  paper  to 
which  we  have  just  listened  could  be  had  in 
ten  minutes ;  and  it  will  be  well  to  postpone  it 
until  after  the  mid-day  recess.  I  will,  there- 
fore, declare  the  conference  adjourned  for  that 
purpose  ;  and  now,  brethren,"  added  the  arch- 
bishop with  that  charming  twinkle  in  his  eye, 
"  the  '  liveried  menials  '  will  show  you  the  way 
to  the  dining-room."  There  went  up,  straight- 
way, a  shout  of  laughter  from  the  conference, 
and,  in  parliamentary  phrase,  "  the  incident 
was  closed." 

Alas  that  the  reign  in  Lambeth  of  that 
charming  personality  was  so  soon  to  be  ended  ! 
I  need  not  rehearse,  here,  the  dramatic  and 
pathetic  conclusion  of  that  gifted  life.  But  no 
one  who  knew  it  will  ever  forget  it,  and  no 
American  guest  at  Lambeth  who  enjoyed  that 
beaming  hospitality  will  be  unmindful  of  the 
charming  and  noble  manhood  that  enshrined 
it! 


•Recollections  of  Hrcbbisbop  ZTemple 


in. 

THE  MOST    REVEREND  DR.    FREDERICK     TEMPLE, 
ARCHBISHOP  OF  CANTERBURY,FROM  1896  TO  1902 

Dr.  Frederick  Temple,  at  that  time  head 
master  of  Rugby  School,  where  he  had 
gone  in  succession  to  Dr.  Archibald  Camp- 
bell Tait,  when  the  latter  became  Dean 
of  Carlisle,  first  came  into  general  notice  in 
connection  with  the  volume  once  famous  under 
the  title  of  Essays  and  Reviews.  Dr.  Temple's 
essay  was  entitled  "  The  Education  of  the 
World,"  and  propounded  a  view  of  the  Bible 
and  of  God's  dealings  with  the  people  of 
Israel  which  is  now,  I  suppose,  universally  ac- 
cepted. Forty  years  ago,  however,  it  was  not 
only  unfamiliar,  but,  as  many  devout  people 
honestly  believed,  heterodox  ;  and  the  volume 
in  which  it  appeared  had  other  essays  which 
even  the  most  advanced  scholars  regarded  with 
apprehension,  if  not  with  positive  disfavour. 

When,  therefore,  Dr.  Temple  was  nominated 
for  the  see  of  Exeter,  especially  as  it  was  in 
succession  to  a  bishop  (Philpotts)  of  most 
aggressive  conservatism,  there  was  a  fierce  out- 
cry of  dissent  from  all  quarters  of  the  Church ; 
and  even  a  menace  of  resistance  to  his  confirm- 


KecoUections  of  Hrcbbisbop  temple 


in. 


THE  MOST    REVEREND  PR.     FREDERICK     TEMPLE, 
ARCHBISHOP  OF  (.     S TERBURY.FROM  1896  TO  1 902 

Dr.    Fr        ick    Temple,  at  that  time  head 

Rugby    School,    where    he    had 

:ws*ion   to  Dr.  Archibald  Camp- 

the    latter    became    Dean 

le,  first  came  into  general  notice  in 

n  with  the  volume  once  famous  under 

The  Most  ^^s^^sf^^^ie^ 

Archbishop ft  'CaSfeVbife'; 

j  '       Fropi.a  photograph  reproduced  by  permission1  of  the ' 

1  iofcfew<*fc*d5co¥*eisU>ci*Jii.e  peopl. 
vhich  is  now,  I  suppose,  universally  ac- 
cepted. Forty  years  ago,  however,  it  was  not 
only  unfamiliar,  but,  as  many  devout  people 
honestly  believed,  heterodox  ;  and  the  volume 
in  which  it  appeared  had  other  essays  which 
even  the  most  advanced  scholars  regarded  with 
apprehension,  if  not  with  positive  disfavour. 

When,  therefore,  Dr.  Temple  was  nominated 
for  the  sec  of  Exeter,  especially  as  it  was  in 
Recession  to  a  bishop  (Philpotts)  of  most 
aggressive  conservatism,  there  was  a  fierce  out- 
:ry  of  dissent  from  all  quarters  of  the  Church  ; 
and  even  a  menace  of  resistance  to  his  confirm^ 


TRecollections  of  Hrcbbisbop  temple  219 

ation  in  Bow  Church,  which  provoked  general 
alarm. 

But  Dr.  Temple  made  a  good  Bishop  of 
Exeter ;  and,  when  Tait  was  promoted  from 
London  to  the  primacy,  was  obviously  the  fit- 
test man  to  succeed  him.  When  I  came  to 
know  him,  Benson  was  Archbishop  of  Canter- 
bury, and  Temple  his  suffragan  in  the  see  of 
London  ;  but  it  was  obvious  enough  that  Ben- 
son had  not  forgotten  the  days  when  he  was  a 
master  at  Rugby,  and  Temple,  as  head  master, 
had  been  his  chief.  Indeed,  I  do  not  recall 
anything  more  charming  than  the  affectionate 
deference  of  the  archbishop  to  his  venerable 
junior.  It  was  in  every  way  appropriate,  there- 
fore, that  when  Benson  was  so  suddenly  cut 
off,  Temple  should  succeed  him;  and  it  was  as 
Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  in  1897,  that  I  first 
came  to  know  him  intimately.  I  had  been  in 
Southern  Europe  during  that  winter,  and  the 
Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  learning  that  I  was 
to  be  in  England  some  weeks  before  the  date 
at  which  the  Lambeth  Conference  was  ap- 
pointed, did  me  the  honour  to  ask  me  to  attend 
a  meeting  of  the  committee  of  arrangements 
for  that  conference  which  he  had  called  at  the 
"Church  House." 

The    "Church    House"    was    a    structure 


220     "Recollections  of  Hrcbbtsbop  ttemple 

erected  in  Dean's  Yard,  Westminster,  under 
the  auspices  of  Archbishop  Benson ;  and  it  tard- 
ily supplied  for  the  Church  what  had  long 
been  needed  in  London.  Here  Archbishop 
Temple  had  summoned  the  Archbishops  of 
York  and  Dublin,  the  Primus  of  the  Church  in 
Scotland,  and  the  Bishops  of  Winchester,  Dur- 
ham, and  others,  to  meet  him,  and  confer  as  to 
the  arrangements  for  the  approaching  Lambeth 
Conference.  He  had  hardly  taken  his  seat, 
however,  before  the  Bishop  of  Durham  (Dr. 
Westcott)  rose  in  his  place,  and  with  a  face 
flushed  with  emotion,  read  from  a  paper  that 
he  held  in  his  shaking  hand,  some  outlines  of 
the  arrangements,  prepared  by  the  Archbishop 
of  Canterbury  himself.  These  arrangements 
contemplated  that  the  conference  should  hold 
some  of  its  sessions  in  the  Church  House  rather 
than  in  the  library  of  Lambeth  Palace,  which 
latter  was  but  poorly  suited  for  a  deliberative 
body,  and  sure  to  be  much  overcrowded. 

It  was  upon  this  proposal  that  the  Bishop  of 
Durham  fastened  with,  what  seemed  to  me, 
needlessly  vehement  emotion.  He  described 
the  plan  of  holding  some  of  the  sessions  of  the 
conference  elsewhere  than  in  Lambeth  as  sure 
to  cause  many  of  the  bishops  unmixed  grief. 
He  described  it  as  the  menace  of  changes  still 


'Recollections  of  Hrcbbisbop  {Temple   221 

more  radical,  yet  to  come ;  and  concluded  by 
saying,  "  Most  Reverend  Sir,  at  this  rate,  I 
should  not  be  surprised  to  hear  it  proposed, 
before  we  adjourn,  that  the  next  Lambeth 
Conference  shall  be  held  in  New  York  !  " 

The  Bishop  of  Durham  sat  down,  and  the 
Bishop  of  Manchester  (Morehouse)  controlled 
his  mirth  sufficiently  to  say,  "The  Bishop  of 
New  York  is  present ;  and  I  am  sure  he  will 
assure  the  Bishop  of  Durham  of  the  great 
pleasure  that  it  would  give  our  American 
friends  to  welcome  the  Lambeth  Conference." 

The  Bishop  of  Durham,  who,  until  that 
moment,  had  been  quite  unaware  of  my  pre- 
sence, turned  to  me  with  a  most  rueful  coun- 
tenance, and  made  his  apologies  ;  and,  as  I  need 
hardly  say,  I  eagerly  rose  to  assure  the  commit- 
tee that  the  Bishop  of  Durham's  idea  was  not 
new  to  us  in  America,  and  would  be  enthusi- 
astically received  on  our  side  of  the  Atlantic. 

But  what,  most  of  all,  impressed  me  in  this 
somewhat  amusing  as  well  as  awkward  scene, 
was  the  absolute  silence  of  the  archbishop. 
He  bent  his  head  and  covered  his  face  with 
his  hands  while  his  brother  of  Durham  de- 
nounced the  archiepiscopal  proposals  ;  but  he 
said  nothing  to  stay  the  storm  of  disapproval 
with  which  his  plans  had  been  visited,  save  that, 


222    "Recollections  ot  Hrcbbtebop  Uemple 

when  the  committee  adjourned,  and  we  scat- 
tered, he  turned  to  me  and  said,  "  Come  over 
to  Lambeth  to  dinner  ! "  I  did  so;  and  though 
for  some  hours  he  made  no  further  allusion  to 
the  subject,  he  turned  to  me  at  the  dinner-table 
and  said,  "  How  would  this  room  do  for  the 
conference  ? "  We  were  dining  in  the  noble 
"  state  dining-room,"  an  apartment  quite  vast 
enough  for  the  meetings  of  the  conference,  but 
not  easily  surrendered,  for  two  or  three  weeks, 
to  any  such  use,  without  the  probability  of 
grave  inconvenience  to  the  archbishop's  house- 
hold. I  ventured  to  say  so ;  whereupon  the 
archbishop  promptly  replied,  "  Oh,  they  can't 
have  it,  if  Mrs.  Temple  disapproves!"  Mrs. 
Temple  did  disapprove,  and  we  did  n't  have  it! 
It  was  this  delightful  candour  on  the  part  of 
Archbishop  Temple  which  we  Americans 
greatly  admired,  and  envied.  We  had  suffered 
at  home  from  a  bishop,  at  that  time  living, 
whose  disease  was  a  passion  for  insisting  upon 
"  points  of  order"  in  the  sessions  of  the  House 
of  Bishops.  His  performances  in  the  Lambeth 
Conference  were  a  painful  illustration  of  the 
maxim,"  Ccelum,  non  animum,  mutant,  qui trans 
mare  currunt"  and,  in  the  Lambeth  Confer- 
ence, he  was  perpetually  on  his  feet,  stating 
points  of  order.  At  last,  one  morning,  the 


IRecolIections  of  Hrcbbisbop  Uemple    223 

patience  of  one  of  the  Anglican  prelates  hav- 
ing been  exhausted,  he  rose  and  made  a 
protest,  to  the  effect  that  the  American  Bishop 

,  who  had  spoken  six  times  that  morning, 

so  making  it  impossible  for  the  Bishop  of  - 
to  speak  at  all,  was  "  out  of  order."  There 
was  a  pause  and  then  the  sharp  voice  of  the 
primate  was  heard,  saying,  "  Oh,  yes  ;  he  is 
grossly  out  of  order.  But  I  have  no  doubt 
that  he  is  ashamed  of  it,  by  this  time."  It  is 
hardly  necessary  to  say  that  we  heard  no  more 

from  the  American  Bishop  of . 

Indeed,  the  primate  was  a  terror  to  bores. 
Near  where  some  of  the  junior  American 
bishops  sat,  was  a  British  colonial  bishop  who, 
because  he  had  a  fashion  of  sitting  with  his 
foot  curled  up  beneath  him,  and  springing  sud- 
denly to  his  feet  that  he  might  interject  into 
the  debates,  at  intervals  all  too  brief,  remarks 
that  were  of  no  pertinence  and  no  value,  was 
profanely  called  "  the  kangaroo."  One  day 
when  Archbishop  Temple,  who  was  nearly 
blind,  was  leaning  on  my  arm  on  his  way  out 
of  the  library,  we  met  this  colonial  bishop. 
'  B—  — ,"  said  the  archbishop,  calling  him,  more 
Anglicano,  by  the  name  of  his  diocese,  "  are  n't 
you  tired?"  "No,  your  Grace,"  said  the 
bishop,  evidently  perplexed  by  the  question, 


224   "Recollections  of  Srcbbisbop  Uemple 

"  I  am  not  tired."  "  You  ought  to  be  !  "  said 
the  archbishop  in  his  most  rasping  tones,  and 
that  bishop  was  heard  from  no  more. 

Archbishop  Temple  suffered,  during  his 
later  years,  from  some  affection  of  the  eyes 
which  made  it  often  impossible  for  him  to 
recognise  those  who  spoke  to  him.  But  his 
kindness  of  heart  was  unfailing,  and  it  led  him 
into  some  curious  blunders.  An  English 
clergyman  told  me  that,  on  one  occasion,  at  a 
garden  party  at  Lambeth,  when  his  guests 
were  paying  their  respects  to  him,  he  said  to 
one  of  those  who  approached  him,  "  How  do 
you  do  ?  How  is  your  father  ?  " 

The  guest  looked  somewhat  surprised,  and 
said,  "  My  father  is  dead,  your  Grace." 

"  And  the  widow,  your  mother,  how  is  she?" 
said  the  archbishop.  "  Thank  you,"  said  the 
guest  a  little  stiffly,  "she  is  quite  well." 

As  he  passed  on,  the  archbishop  turned  to  a 
clergyman  who  stood  near  him  and  said,  "By 
the  way,  who  was  that  ?  "  Said  the  archdeacon 
who  answered  the  question,  I  am  afraid  with  a 
little  spice  of  mischief  in  his  tone,  "  That,  your 
Grace,  was  the  Duke  of  Connaught." 

But  in  spite  of  his  eccentricities  of  temper 
and  of  speech,  England  has  not  often  seen  a 
greater  archbishop  than  Temple.  Men  have 


•Recollections  ot  Hrcbbisbop  Uemple    225 

said  that  the  English  Church  has  blundered  in 
turning,  so  often,  to  the  public  schools  for  her 
bishops.  Think  of  it !  Every  one  of  those 
whom  I  have  recalled  here  had  been  a  master, 
or  head  master,  at  Rugby.  I  have  not  myself 
the  smallest  doubt  that,  in  governing  boys, 
they  learned  how  to  govern  men  ;  and  that,  in 
that  microcosm  of  the  larger  life  of  dioceses 
and  provinces,  they  were  trained  with  pre- 
eminent fitness  and  thoroughness  for  the 
greater  tasks  of  the  archiepiscopate.  "  All 
life,"  we  are  wont  to  say,  "  is  a  schoolroom." 
Happy  he  who  can  take  with  him  into  the 
arenas  of  the  greater  world  the  lessons  that  he 
has  learned  as  a  boy ! 

FINIS. 


BX 


THE  LIBRARY 
UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 

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